Proponents of legalizing assisted suicide promise a peaceful death to those wishing to end their lives. Peacefulness is a hollow promise in these cases.

Last month, Illinois State Senator Linda Holmes introduced Senate Bill 3499 (SB3499), which would authorize “a qualified patient with a terminal disease to request that a physician prescribe aid-in-dying medication that will allow the patient to end the patient’s life in a peaceful manner.”

SB3499 offers 4½ pages of definitions for terms in the legislation but fails to define the medication that is used for the patient to kill themselves. What is this medication? 

This is not a single pill but a cocktail of controlled barbiturates that has been tested on humans over the last decade with little to no ethical oversight. Through federal requirements, the Institutional Review Board monitors all U.S. biomedical research on humans according to ethical standards, ensuring that humans in research projects are at minimal risk in relation to the anticipated benefits. The medical cocktail that is self-administered to kill yourself has not been developed using ethics review committees.

In 2019, The Atlantic stated, “work [to develop such medication] has taken place on the margins of traditional science … it’s a part of medicine that’s still practiced in
the shadows.”

What have the shadows seen? Cocktails used over the years have burned patients’ mouths and throats, and patients have vomited up the cocktail. One cocktail, described as a “blue-whale sized dose,” is a bitter, liquid mixture akin to crushing up two bottles of aspirin mixed with “less than a half cup of water,” according to Patients’ Rights Action Fund, a national organization opposing assisted suicide.

SB3499 would legalize self-administering drugs.  No physician or clinician would be present. The health care professional “aids” the person by prescribing the medication. The person dies alone or dies attended by a caretaker, who is not equipped to handle medical complications. 

The median time of death for those taking one cocktail was 85 minutes. Yet another cocktail acted within one minute to 19 hours, with one person taking up to 31 hours to die. A person may slip into and out of a coma. Even if the person is unconscious, the caretaker is aware of the drawn-out time.

Dying, especially in cases of an illness that lingers, is terrible. The body may suffer horrifically. Psychologically, the suffering person may experience loneliness, regret at being a burden to loved ones, and perhaps joyless last days. Death may bring on spiritual doubt or battle.

Dying well likely cannot be achieved through the quick fix of medication developed inhumanely. A peaceful death may be possible only by embracing the truths of our faith.

A classic 15th-century Catholic text, Ars moriendi (The Art of Dying), encourages us to prepare well in advance for our death: “It is of the utmost importance for the dying person to tend carefully to his soul, so it will not perish at the time of death … [the dying person] should know that Christ died for him and that there is no other way he can be saved except by the merit of the Passion of Christ … If he is able to assent to these items with a sincere heart, it is a sign that he is to be numbered among the saved.”

Does not knowing our souls are saved bring true peace?

We must actively oppose SB3499 for ethical as well as theological reasons.

Physician assisted suicide is suicide. Call or text the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 for 24/7, free, and confidential help if you are in distress or if you need resources for you or your loved ones.