“It’s Not That I Want to Die. It’s That I Want to Control My Own Suffering.”: Advocates urge Maryland lawmakers to pass tabled aid-in-dying bill. - Washington City Paper

 "In 2015, for the first time, Maryland’s legislature began considering a death with dignity bill, which would make it legal for physicians to help patients with a terminal prognosis of six months or less to end their lives. After two public hearings—one before the state’s House of Delegates, another before the Senate—the legislation was tabled for the remainder of the session. But after some tweaking, the bill’s sponsors say it will be back in the next session in January.



 If passed, Maryland’s death with dignity law would look much like Oregon’s. Three separate requests by the patient—first oral, then written, then oral again—would be required. Two witnesses would have to sign the written request, and at least one couldn’t be a relative or someone who will benefit financially from the patient’s death. Anyone who chooses to use the law would be marked as having died of natural causes, protecting life insurance policies.



 In her work as a patient advocate, Lange is intimately exposed to death in all its forms and progressions. She says she feels a sense of responsibility to the women she’s watched die and to the people “actively dying” who are too sick to come testify. On breast cancer, Lange is a public advocate, but on death with dignity she speaks as a private citizen who’s made it her business to openly and avidly support the legislative effort in Maryland."



“It’s Not That I Want to Die. It’s That I Want to Control My Own Suffering.”: Advocates urge Maryland lawmakers to pass tabled aid-in-dying bill. - Washington City Paper