Right-to-die debate opens for Macron’s citizen panel

A CITIZENS’ council has started a debate over whether assisted suicide should be legal in France, in an initiative launched by President Emmanuel Macron.

The council will spend three months tackling the thorny ethical issue amid growing calls to allow medically assisted death for the terminally ill.

Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Spain all allow active euthanasia, where a doctor administers a fatal dose of a drug at the request of a patient to relieve suffering.

Assisted suicide, in which the physician supplies the drug but the patient administers it, is legal in Austria, Switzerland and Italy.

In France, neither practice is legal, prompting dozens of French people to travel to Switzerland to end their lives.

Under current legislation, known as the Claeys-léonetti law, doctors are authorised to intervene at the end of life to deeply sedate terminally ill patients until they die naturally. Such patients also have the right to refuse life-sustaining treatment and can state this preference in advance.

Call for reform was spurred by the death of the legendary Franco-swiss film director Jean-luc Godard who, on Sept 13, chose assisted suicide in Switzerland at the age of 92. That same day, Mr Macron announced the launch of a national debate via the citizens’ assembly, which runs until March 2023.

It is only the second citizens’ council. The first was tasked with debating climate change but Mr Macron was criticised for ignoring its recommendations. This time, parliament will decide.