Will added restrictions help Connecticut’s new medical aid-in-dying bill pass this time around?

By Katie Pellico,

Published February 8, 2023 at 8:16 AM EST

Deb Howland Murray and her son, Galen, embrace in the State Capitol after hanging a poster of husband and father, David Murray, alongside more than a dozen portraits hung by loved ones supporting the right to medical aid in dying. This legislative session marks at least the twelfth time aid-in-dying legislation has been discussed in the Public Health Committee since 1995. About her husband, Deb said, “He used to say ‘congratulations’ about people who managed to crossover, essentially, because he thought it took tremendous courage and fortitude. David wasn’t afraid of death, he faced it with a tremendously positive attitude. And his wish, rather than being able to live longer, was to die the way he wanted to die; with his family and in our home of 34 years. Instead, it was very, very difficult experience. He was in pain, he was not able to communicate anymore. So his facial expressions would tell us what he was feeling, at least that he was in distress. And it was not a life he would have wanted for someone who faced it with such a philosophical attitude, to have to be so much in pain and undignified, really undignified.”

Ten states and Washington D.C. currently support medical aid in dying for terminally-ill patients. Advocates and lawmakers like Public Health Committee Co-Chair and State Sen. Dr. Saud Anwar are hoping Connecticut is closer than ever to becoming the eleventh state to adopt a medical aid-in-dying law.

Connecticut Public health reporter Sujata Srinivasan spoke with Sen. Anwar about the plan to include additional restrictions around age limits and physician sign-offs, that he hopes will help the bill pass the Judiciary Committee, where a similar bill stopped last session.

Aid-in-dying bills have been proposed in Connecticut more than a dozen times over the last thirty years.

Longtime NPR host and journalist Diane Rehm has touched on her mother's death and her late husband's battle with Parkinson's Disease, setting out to explore the issue of patient autonomy in her book, When My Time Comes: Conversations About Whether Those Who Are Dying Should Have the Right to Determine When Life Should End.

This hour, Rehm and Srinivasan will join us to discuss the right-to-die movement where we live, along with CT News Junkie editor-in-chief Christine Stuart. Plus, a preview of the biennial state budget with Stuart and News 12 political reporter John Craven.

GUESTS:

Diane Rehm: Host, On My Mind with Diane Rehm; Author, When My Time Comes: Conversations About Whether Those Who Are Dying Should Have the Right To Determine When Life Should End
Sujata Srinivasan: Senior Health Reporter, Connecticut Public
Anita Hannig: Cultural Anthropologist; Author, The Day I Die: The Untold Story of Assisted Dying in America
Christine Stuart: Editor-in-Chief, CT News Junkie
John Craven: Political Reporter, News 12 Connecticut

Where We Live is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!