These countries offer or are considering assisted dying. How it's done

1. SWITZERLAND – Switzerland legalized assisted dying in 1942 on the condition that the motive was not selfish, making it the first country in the world to allow the practice. Doctors can prescribe and administer medications, or have them come in for self-administration. A number of Swiss organizations such as Dignitas offer their services to foreigners.
2. UNITED STATES – Medical aid in dying, also called physician-assisted dying, is legal in ten states: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Montana, Maine, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Vermont and Washington, plus the District of Columbia. Oregon was the first state to legalize it under a law that took effect in 1997. It allows mentally competent patients who are terminally ill and have less than six months to live to request life-ending drugs. People from outside Oregon can travel to the state to take advantage of the law.
3. THE NETHERLANDS – The “Termination of Life on Request and Assisted Suicide (Revision Procedures) Act” entered into force in 2002. A doctor is immune from punishment for euthanasia and assisted suicide where patients experience “unbearable suffering with no prospect of improvement.” Minors can request euthanasia from the age of 12, but require parental consent before the age of 16.
4. BELGIUM – Belgium legalized medically assisted dying in 2002 for the terminally ill and for people experiencing unbearable suffering, including patients with psychiatric disorders. Since 2014, people under the age of 18 who are terminally ill are covered by the law, as long as they have parental consent.
5. CANADA – Canada introduced “Medical Assistance in Dying” in 2016 for those whose deaths were deemed “reasonably foreseeable.” Five years later, the law was expanded to allow people with “serious and irremediable” medical conditions to apply for assisted death. The country has postponed until 2027 a plan to expand medical assistance in dying to people with mental illness.
6. AUSTRALIA – Voluntary assisted dying for the terminally ill or those with a condition causing unbearable suffering is legal in most Australian states, after first being introduced in Victoria in 2019. Doctors may prescribe medications for self-administration or administer them as needed.
7. SPAIN – Spain passed a law in 2021 allowing euthanasia and medically assisted suicide for people with incurable or debilitating diseases who wish to end their lives.
8. GERMANY – Assisted dying was legal in Germany until 2015, when the country banned its provision on an organized or commercial basis, effectively banning it in many cases. Five years later, the nation's highest court ruled in favor of groups that provide assisted suicide to terminally ill adults, but lawmakers have yet to finalize new rules.
9. FRANCE – Since 2016, doctors in France have been allowed to deeply sedate a person who is near death and in a lot of pain, but are not allowed to administer life-ending drugs. President Emmanuel Macron earlier this year backed new legislation that would allow assisted death for people with incurable conditions. A bill was introduced in April, but elections in June and July interrupted the bill's progress.
10. BRITAIN – A bill to give terminally ill adults with six months or less to live the right to end their lives was introduced to parliament earlier in October and will be debated on November 29.
11. IRELAND – A cross-party Irish parliamentary committee recommended this year that the government should legalize assisted dying under certain limited circumstances. A majority of lawmakers voted in October in favor of “noting” the commission's findings. With national elections taking place on November 29, it is up to the next government to decide whether to consider proposing a new law.

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