- The Virginia General Assembly on Monday delayed a bill allowing medically assisted suicide for another year.
- The House Delegates Committee voted to carry the bill to the 2025 session, eliminating any chance of it becoming law this year.
- Several Democratic committee members have expressed openness to passing legislation similar to state Sen. Ghazala Hashmi’s bill in the future.
The Virginia General Assembly on Monday rejected for another year a bill that would have allowed certain adults facing a terminal illness to self-administer controlled substances prescribed by a health care provider to end their own lives. did.
That chance ends this year, with a House committee voting to move Democratic Sen. Ghazala Hashmi’s medically assisted suicide bill to the 2025 Congress.
A similar bill failed last year. But Hashmi’s bill passed the Senate on a party-line vote in February with support from Rep. Jennifer Wexton, a Democratic former state senator who has been diagnosed with a terminal neurological disease.
VA lawmakers oppose restrictions on personal use of campaign funds
Wexton and other supporters said the bill would give dying people a sense of compassion by giving them control over how their lives end.
The bill limits eligibility to mentally competent individuals over the age of 18 who have been diagnosed with a life expectancy of six months or less. Hashmi said Monday that 10 other states and the District of Columbia have passed similar legislation.
The Virginia State Capitol on March 4, 2010 in Richmond, Virginia. (AP Photo/Steve Herber, File)
“This legislation would allow eligible individuals to independently decide when their suffering has become too great and to do so by dying peacefully in their sleep of their own free will,” he said at a previous subcommittee hearing. We can alleviate suffering.”
Religious groups and social conservative groups opposed the measure.
“Assisted suicide exacerbates tragedy and makes the most vulnerable even more vulnerable,” Bishop Michael Burbidge of the Catholic Diocese of Arlington and Bishop Barry Knestout of the Catholic Diocese of Richmond said in a joint statement released last month. said. “Legalizing this would put the lives of people with disabilities, mental illnesses, the elderly, and those who cannot afford health care at greater risk of deadly harm.”
Some health care providers also opposed the measure, arguing that contributing to suicide violates professional standards.
A companion bill was introduced in the House of Delegates by Representative Patrick Hope, but failed to pass the floor.
Monday’s decision to carry forward the bill was made by an unrecorded voice vote. Several Democrats on the committee expressed support for the bill’s concept and said they expected or expected it to pass in the future.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
“I’m confident that one day this will move forward,” Hope said.
