Oregon Releases 2005 Assisted Suicide Data

According to the first report issued since the U.S. Supreme Court in January upheld the Oregon Death with Dignity Act, the number of terminally ill Oregon residents who sought physician-assisted suicide remained about the same between 2004 and 2005. The report released by the state Department of Human Services indicates that 38 state residents sought assisted suicide in 2005, compared with 37 in 2004.

The law, which took effect in 1997, allows physicians to prescribe, but not administer, a lethal dose of prescription drugs to a terminally ill patient after two physicians agree that the patient has less than six months to live, has decided to die voluntarily and can make health care decisions.

The full report is available at http://www.oregon.gov/DHS/ph/pas/