France legalized euthanasia. What's next?

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director,
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

On July 15, France's National Assembly passed a bill to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide by a vote of 291 to 241. This was the final vote in the National Assembly and it over rides the previous votes rejecting the euthanasia bill in France's Senate.

Agence France-Presse reported on July 15 (translated):

For the fourth time in a year, the National Assembly – the lower house of the French Parliament – approved the bill, by 291 votes to 241 (and 29 abstentions).

In a restraint session, MPs, to whom the government gave the final say after three rejections from the Senate – the upper house – authorized assisted suicide assistance for the first time, or even euthanasia, with a series of conditions.

We are concerned that pressure to expand an already expansive law will lead to quick expansions of the law. Agence France-Presse also reported that:

Before attending the vote, the president of the Association for the Right to Die with Dignity (ADMD), Jonathan Denis, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that the ADMD, spearheading the fight for this new right for decades, would continue to fight on the free choice between assisted suicide and euthanasia or the consideration of advance directives and psychological suffering.

The euthanasia lobby is pushing to expand the law to allow euthanasia by advanced request and euthanasia for mental illness alone, similar to the political push by Canada's euthanasia lobby.

 

Wesley Smith

Based on media reports, Wesley Smith wrote that:

• The bill does not require terminal illness. Rather, it requires a “serious and incurable illness” that “threatens life in an advanced or terminal stage” — meaning death could be years away. The patient must also experience “constant physical or psychological suffering” related to the disease that is “resistant to treatment or unbearable” (as defined by the patient). Psychological suffering alone does not make one eligible for hastened death.

• There is no time set for when a disease “threatens life.”

• Only French legal residents and citizens 18 and over are eligible.

• Doctors can kill requesting patients when they are unable to kill themselves. Inability to self-administer death is not defined.

• There is only a two-day waiting period between approved request and the ability to become dead.

• There are no meaningful conscience protections for doctors unwilling to kill or prescribe poison nor explicit protections for dissenting health-care institutions. While doctors need not personally end life, they must be complicit by providing patients with the names of doctors willing to do the lethal deed.

• France’s national health service will pay for the death (which could save it a lot of money, as expensive patients will be no more). 

The battle is not over. Agence France-Presse reported that:

The President of the Senate, Gérard Larcher, Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu announced Tuesday that he would refer the matter to the Constitutional Council, to take into account the oppositions that persist, especially on the right.

In a decision that could take place around August 15, the Sages will have to say whether certain clauses, such as the minimum period of reflection of two days granted to the patient after the agreement of doctors to assist in dying, are compatible with the principles of individual freedom and human dignity, according to the services of the Prime Minister.

We hope that the Constitutional Council rejects, or at least moderates the bill. 

France's Presidential election will be in April 2027. It is our hope that Emmanuel Macron will be replaced by someone who opposes euthanasia.

France's Prime Minister, Sébastien Lecornu, opposed the euthanasia bill.