The BMA’s End-of Life Care and Physician-Assisted Dying report contains much valuable material and warrants careful study.
The BMA has published a report, following some 15 months of study, into ‘End-of-Life Care and Physician-Assisted Dying’. The report, which is in three volumes, contains many valuable observations on how the care of people nearing the end of their lives might be improved. It also contains useful data and observations in relation to the political debate on legalisation of ‘assisted dying’. Overall we believe the report makes a valuable contribution to the end-of-lfe debate.
It would appear, however, that this view is not shared by the ‘assisted dying’ lobby. The campaigning group Dignity in Dying (DiD) has complained to the BMA that in its view the report is ‘incomplete’ and considers physician-assisted dying in the round rather than focusing specifically on DiD’s own proposals for legalisation – proposals which were rejected by Parliament in 2015. We believe these strictures, which are concerned solely with one aspect of the report and ignore the wider end-of-life care picture, are unwarranted and we have made our views of them know to the BMA. To read our analysis click on ‘View publication’.
LDW-Medicine-BMA-Response-to-DiD-11-May-16