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Governor of New York Kathy Hochul said she plans to sign legislation to legalize medically assisted suicide for terminally ill patients under an agreement reached with state legislative leaders.
The governor intends to sign the bill into law next year after working to add a number of “guardrails,” she wrote in an Albany Times Union op-ed announcing her plans. Measure, approved by state legislators during their regulatory session earlier this year, will go into effect six months after it is signed.
Hochul, a Catholic, said she listened to New Yorkers experiencing “the agony of pain and suffering” and their children, and also listened to “people of many faiths who believe that the deliberate shortening of life violates the sanctity of life.”
“I was taught that God is merciful and compassionate and we should be the same,” she wrote. “This includes providing compassionate options to those facing the unimaginable and seeking comfort in their final months in this life.”
NEW JERSEY MEDICALLY ASSISTED SUICIDE LAW APPLY TO STATE RESIDENTS ONLY, COURT OF APPEALS RULES
New York Governor Kathy Hochul said she plans to sign legislation to legalize medically assisted suicide for terminally ill patients. (Julia Nihinson, File/AP Photo)
New York will join a dozen other states and Washington, D.C., in passing laws allowing physician-assisted suicide for terminally ill adults, including Delaware and Illinois, which each approved legislation this year that will take effect in 2026.
A number of other countries, including Canada, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Australia and Colombia, have also adequately legalized the so-called death.
New York's bill, called the Medical Aid in Dying Act, would require a terminally ill person who is expected to die within six months to submit a written request for lethal drugs. Two witnesses must sign the request to ensure that the patient is not being coerced, and the request must be approved by the patient's treating physician and consulting physician.
The bill's sponsors and legislative leaders agreed to add provisions requiring a doctor to certify that a person “truly has less than six months to live” as well as certification from a psychologist or psychiatrist that the patient is capable of making a decision without coercion.
“The Medical Assistance in Dying Act would give terminally ill New Yorkers the right to spend their final days not under sterile hospital lights, but with sunlight streaming through their bedroom window,” Hochul wrote.
“The right to spend their last days not having to listen to the humming noise of hospital machines, but instead the laughter of their grandchildren echoing in the next room. The right to tell your family they love them and to be able to hear those precious words back,” she added.
The measure will come into force six months after signing. (Photo by Alex Kent/Getty Images)
Hochul said the bill would include a mandatory five-day waiting period in addition to a written and recorded oral request to “certify free will.” Outpatient facilities affiliated with religious hospitals may refuse to offer medically assisted suicide.
The governor also said she wants the bill to apply only to New Yorkers.
Earlier this month federal appeals court ruled that a similar law in New Jersey applies only to residents of the state and that people from other jurisdictions cannot seek medical attention while dying in the Garden State.
“Death ends good things, but rarely neatly,” U.S. District Court Judge Stephanos Bibas wrote in his opinion. “Many terminally ill patients face a grim reality: an inevitable, painful death. Some may want to prevent this suffering by enlisting the help of a doctor to end their life. New Jersey allows its residents to make this choice, but only its residents.”
Hochul said Wednesday that supporting the New York bill was one of the most difficult decisions she has made as governor.
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The governor said she wants the bill to apply only to New Yorkers. (AP Photo/Hans Pennink)
“Who am I to deny you or your loved one what they ask for at the end of their life?” she said. “I couldn't do it anymore.”
The bill was first introduced in 2016 but stalled for years as religious groups such as the New York State Catholic Conference tried to block the measure, arguing it would devalue human life and undermine the doctor's role as healer.
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Cardinal Timothy Dolan and the New York bishops said in a statement after Hochul's announcement that her support for the bill “signals that our government is abandoning its most vulnerable citizens by telling people who are sick or disabled that suicide in their case is not only acceptable, but encouraged by our elected leaders.”
But supporters of the law argued it would reduce the suffering of terminally ill people and allow them to die on their own terms.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
