The bill on “end of life”, which will include highly regulated “assisted dying”, will be examined in plenary session at the National Assembly from May 27, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced on Monday March 11 on x.

Death cannot be a taboo, silent subject.

Despite considerable progress in recent years, some of our fellow citizens sometimes find themselves powerless in the face of illness and pain.

This is why, in accordance with his 2022 commitment, the president of the… pic.twitter.com/8rX6uCR05s

— Gabriel Attal (@GabrielAttal) March 11, 2024

President Emmanuel Macron finally announced on Sunday that the bill would open up, for adults, the "possibility of requesting assistance in dying under certain strict conditions", in particular that the candidates be "capable of full and complete discernment", which excludes, for example, psychiatric patients or cases of Alzheimer's.

The bill, which must be transmitted within ten days to the Council of State, will concern people suffering from an "incurable" pathology with a "short or medium term vital prognosis", and suffering "refractory" suffering. that cannot be relieved.

This “help” will be conditional on the “collegial” opinion of the medical team within 15 days.

The patient may absorb the deadly product alone or, when unable to do so, particularly in the case of certain neurodegenerative diseases such as Charcot's disease, with the assistance of a member of the medical profession or a specialist. a voluntary person designated by him.

Expecting resistance from the right of the hemicycle, the Prime Minister recalled on long-standing" and constitutes "progress".

A “deception” according to the Church of France

Caregiver associations and the Church of France strongly criticized the bill, with caregivers calling it a project "which goes against the values ​​of care" and the Church a "deception".

“It is with dismay, anger and sadness that the caregivers gathered within the end-of-life collective learned of the interview with the President of the Republic,” reacted in a press release several caregiver associations, including the Society support and palliative care (Sfap), the French Association of Supportive Oncological Care (Afsos) or the French National Association of Nurses in Advanced Practices (Anfipa).

“With great violence, the Head of State announces a system far removed from the needs of patients and the daily realities of caregivers, with serious consequences on the care relationship in perspective,” they add.

For them, “dying with dignity is a very legitimate request, but it is precisely the mission of palliative care which is notoriously under-resourced” in France.

"Removing the sick to eliminate the problem at a lower cost, that is what this announcement ultimately proposes", which "goes against the values ​​of care and non-abandonment which are the basis of our French model of support for the end of life", they estimate.

The question of the conscience clause

For the Church, "calling a 'law of fraternity' a text which opens up both assisted suicide and euthanasia is a deception. Such a law, whatever we want, will tilt our entire health system towards death as solution", declares in La Croix Éric de Moulins-Beaufort, president of the Conference of Bishops of France.

“The President of the Republic presents a well-crafted text on what he calls 'assisted dying', but, on palliative care, (these are) vague promises with completely approximate figures,” adds he.

Furthermore, "nowhere does a specific conscience clause appear: isn't that lacking?" he asked, calling on parliamentarians "to measure how ambiguous the announced text is."

“A very bad surprise,” added Mgr Matthieu Rougé, Bishop of Nanterre, on France Inter.

"There is something incomprehensible, and the concealment, behind a term of fraternity, of the absence of fraternity", according to this bishop.

He was also outraged that lethal injection would be “permitted not only at home but also in nursing homes”.

“What does that mean? That we are going to massively open up the possibility of lethal actions in nursing homes?” he asked.

“What strikes me is that we have the impression that in the ‘start-up nation’, non-productive people no longer have the right to live,” lamented Mgr Rougé.

With AFP

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