By: Ezra Ashkenazi
Starting Thursday, the terminally ill of New Jersey will be allowed to willingly pull their own plug by self-administering lethal drugs. The act that allows this is called the “Medical Aid in Dying for the Terminally Ill Act.” This law allows for mentally sound New Jersey residents to commit suicide if they have six months or fewer to live. Susan Boyce, a terminally ill patient and an outspoken advocate for the law said, “This law provides incredible peace of mind to people in my situation, knowing they have this option within reach… It does a lot to counteract the fear and uncertainty about what the end is going to be like, and are you going to be able to stand it.”
Boyce herself has an incurable disease that will ultimately lead her to be unable to breath and to fight off diseases. Boyce and others have been advocating for the law to be passed for eight years, and they were finally successful, she added that, “I firmly believe in this law, and I had the ability to speak out, to represent a group of patients who are terminally ill and don’t have the strength.” There has been a lot of controversy around the question of whether patients can pull the plug, ever since medical technology has been able to prolong life, even if the life isn’t worth living.
The new act was approved by the New Jersey government and the bill was signed by Gov. Phil Murphy, who although is a religious Catholic, inked the bill in April. If one would want to go ahead and receive the lethal injections, a patient would have to show the doctor proof that they in fact are a New Jersey resident.
They would have to show the physician a valid state-issued ID, voter registration, or according to the law itself, “Any other government record that the attending physician reasonably believes to demonstrate the individual’s current residency in this State,” According to information collected by NJ.com, a total 3,478 people in the US have been allowed to end their lives under death-with-dignity laws passed in California, Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Vermont and Washington. In states like Montana though, assisted death has been allowed since the year of 2009. However, not every state allows terminally ill patients to commit suicide, with around 40 states that have not passed acts that allow assisted death. This movement is moving across America very quickly, and it just succeeded in New Jersey.
