France’s parliament has voted in favour of a bill to legalise assisted dying, paving the way for euthanasia and assisted dying under what campaigners say would still be some of the strictest conditions in Europe, reports The Guardian.
After a sometimes emotional session, deputies passed the first reading of the bill by a vote of 305 to 199. They also unanimously backed a less contentious law establishing a right to palliative care in specialist end-of-life institutions.
Both votes are the start of a long parliamentary process that will require the bills to move on to the Senate – the upper house – and then back to the lower house – the National Assembly – for a second reading, meaning they are unlikely to become law before next year.
The government has described the right-to-die law as “an ethical response to the need to support the sick and the suffering”, insisting it was “neither a new right nor a freedom … but a balance between respect and personal autonomy”.
The legislation would allow a medical team to decide if a patient is eligible to “gain access to a lethal substance when they have expressed the wish”. Patients would be able to use it themselves or have it administered by a nurse or doctor “if they are in no condition physically to do so themselves”.
Patients must meet a number of strict conditions: they must be over 18, hold French citizenship or residency and suffer from a “serious and incurable, life-threatening, advanced or terminal illness” that is “irreversible”.