HEALTH

Medical Express - A number of countries, including the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, and Canada, have already legalized various forms of assisted dying, whereby patients self-administer life-ending medication, and euthanasia, where a doctor administers it directly. If the UK bill is passed—and there are still many stages to go—then irremediable suffering from a terminal medical condition would be a strict legal criterion for someone to have the legal right to end their life. But critics of the bill have raised concerns about the potential for this legal definition to be extended in the future.

In the Netherlands, there has been a significant recent rise in euthanasia cases granted for psychological suffering, highlighting how non-terminal conditions—including profound existential distress, such as tiredness of life—are increasingly being considered there. In Belgium, around 20% of 3,423 reported cases of euthanasia between January 2022 and December 2023 did not involve people with a terminal condition.