27 serious problems with France’s assisted suicide bill outlined by Christian legal advocacy group

Ahead of a crucial reading of a bill to legalize assisted suicide in France later this week, a Christian legal advocacy group has offered a breakdown of the bill highlighting nearly 30 shortcomings in it that will put vulnerable lives at risk. 

France’s Senate has already rejected the bill three times, but the National Assembly will hold a final reading on it July 15, a moment when the bill appears to have “legislative momentum” favoring its supporters, according to the news agency Zenit. The “Aid in Dying” Bill has had more than 1,800 proposed amendments and remains strikingly contentious as the July 7 Senate vote was 169-164, with 11 abstentions, Zenit reported. 

Ahead of the National Assembly’s reading, however, the European Center of Law and Justice (ECLJ) highlighted in a press release 27 serious issues in the bill, saying they should be sufficient to convince assembly members to reject the bill. 

ECLJ: Legalizing assisted suicide could create 'a right to kill' amid fiscal interests

In the release, the ECLJ also offered a number of facts that should be taken into consideration — in particular, that 10% of French people are on antidepressants, and that the French Society for Support and Palliative Care has estimated that one million French people could be “eligible” for assisted suicide. Further, legalizing assisted suicide will save an estimated 1.4 billion euros annually in healthcare, elderly care, and retirement costs, according to the ECLJ. 

“The so-called ‘freedom to die’ that this law establishes will also — and above all — be a ‘right to kill,’” the ECLJ warned in the release. “The law will be virtually impossible to challenge and to bring justice for all the abuses that this procedure is bound to facilitate and multiply. People who are senile, bedridden, or mentally impaired are particularly at risk under this bill. If passed, the bill will make it possible to eliminate them.”

The organization said it is “already mobilizing” to bring the issue before the Constitutional Council and the European Court of Human Rights, an international court that evaluates alleged violations of civil and political rights in an international treaty called the European Convention on Human Rights. 

In the release, the ECLJ outlined the many serious issues in the text, stating, “Anyone who carefully reads the proposed law on ‘aid in dying’ should find it impossible to support.”

An assisted suicide request could be approved, administered within 3 days

Among the serious problems in the bill is that only one physician is required to be directly involved in the whole euthanasia procedure, though the physician must consult with another physician and another healthcare professional before making the final decision. Further, “In practice, the doctor’s affirmation of the patient’s wish to die is sufficient. No witness is required to attest to the authenticity of such a request. In each case, the doctor meets with the person concerned alone,” the ECLJ added. The doctor is not required to be the person’s primary care physician and may meet the person requesting assisted suicide for the first time on the day that the person makes the request. 

The law does not have any formal requirements for expressing the desire to die, according to the ECLJ — rather, the person can request assisted suicide in writing or “by any other means of expression appropriate to the person’s abilities,” article five of the bill states. 

Further, the bill does not exclude people with serious mental disorders from eligibility, even if they have shown suicidal tendencies; eligibility also does not require a terminal illness. The bill instead requires someone to have “a serious and incurable condition” that is life-threatening, in an advanced stage evidenced by affecting the person’s quality of life by worsening his or her health. 

According to the ECLJ, palliative care “is largely unavailable in France,” and in the bill it does not specifically state that the person has a right to palliative care. The bill does state, however, that the physician “informs the person that they can benefit from the support and palliative care defined in Article L. 1110-10 and ensures, if they wish, that they can have access to it.” 

The ECLJ also outlined a number of concerns with the physician consultation process, pointing out that the physician must consult with two individuals, a physician and either a medical assistant or nursing aide under the physician’s supervisory authority — but the consultation can be held by a video meeting, without ever having met the person who applied for assisted suicide and without having verified the application’s validity. 

The physician can make a final decision immediately after the consultation and is not required to examine the person who requested assisted suicide a second time, according to the ECLJ, which added that the person has two days of reflection on the decision after the physician makes one. 

“Potentially, the entire process could be completed in three days,” the ECLJ said. The organization added that only after confirming that he or she wants to die will the person be informed “of how the lethal substance works.” 

Family is excluded from the process

Further, relatives of the person who requested assisted suicide do not have the right to challenge the physician’s decision in court, nor are they given the right to be informed that their loved one is being euthanized; moreover, the physician or nurse is also required to ensure that relatives and friends of the person do not pressure the person to withdraw his or her assisted suicide request. 

The bill requires the patient to be at least 18 years old. However, it allows for euthanasia for those under guardianship or conservatorship, or those with impaired judgement. 

“Even if a person under guardianship or conservatorship requests that a family member be consulted, the physician may refuse,” the ECLJ later added. 

Additionally, the whole cost of the assisted suicide procedure, “including fees and compensation, is covered by Social Security,” according to the ECLJ. 

Further concerns: Conscience objections, the organ-harvesting industry, and post-death review of the process

The bill also does not protect healthcare institutions or physicians who object to the practice; those who refuse to euthanize another human being out of conscience objections are required to designate another physician to carry it out in their stead. Pharmacists are also not given a conscience clause and are mandated “to prepare the lethal medication under penalty of disciplinary sanctions,” according to the ECLJ. 

Further, religious and private institutions “are required to accommodate mobile euthanasia teams and to allow euthanasia for their residents and patients under penalty of prosecution and administrative and financial sanctions,” the ECLJ stated. 

The bill also does not protect from abuses related to the organ procurement industry, according to the ECLJ, which noted that amendments “aimed at separating euthanasia procedures from organ procurement procedures were all rejected.”

Finally, an eight-person commission conducts a review of the assisted suicide process after the person’s death, and the review is based only on information that the physician provides, accroding to the ECLJ. The ECLJ stated that the commission includes two judges, two physicians, and four people who are members from “associations and professionals in the humanities and social sciences.”