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Article: Physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia in the Netherlands: a report to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution.
- Article from:
- Issues in Law & Medicine
- Article date:
- December 22, 1998
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 National Legal Center for the Medically Dependent & Disabled, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Executive Summary
This report examines legal developments and policy arguments in the Netherlands which, in the past 23 years, have led from toleration of the practice of physician-assisted suicide for physically-suffering, terminally-ill, competent patients to the judicial and medical sanctioning of the nonconsensual termination of patients' lives.
Since 1886, the Dutch Penal Code has prohibited assisted suicide and euthanasia. However, in the 1970s the Dutch courts began to tolerate physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia for terminally-ill, competent patients. By the early 1980s, the medical profession and courts in the Netherlands had established ...