In Controversial Ruling, Judge Says Doctors in New Mexico Can Now Assist in Terminal Patient Suicides
In a decision that has sparked a contentious debate online, a New Mexico judge ruled Monday that terminally ill and mentally fit patients have the right to commit suicide with the help of doctors.
New Mexico could join Oregon, Washington, Montana and Vermont to become the fifth state in America to allow doctors to help their terminally ill patients commit suicide, according to CNN.
The ruling delivered Monday by New Mexico Second Judicial District Judge Nan Nash stemmed from a lawsuit filed by the ACLU and an end-of-life advocacy group called Compassion & Choices on behalf of cancer patient Aja Riggs and two New Mexico doctors. Nash was asked to consider whether or not doctors should be allowed to prescribe drugs to end the life of a terminally ill cancer patient.
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"This Court cannot envision a right more fundamental, more private or more integral to the liberty, safety and happiness of a New Mexican than the right of a competent, terminally ill patient to choose aid in dying," Nash wrote in the decision.
"If decisions made in the shadow of one's imminent death regarding how they and their loved ones will face that death are not fundamental and at the core of these constitutional guarantees, than [sic] what decisions are?" noted Nash.
The decision is currently being assessed by the office of New Mexico's Attorney General to see if it warrants an appeal.
In the meantime, however, Aja Riggs, whose cancer is currently in remission according to the decision, told CNN that she is happy about the choice the ruling has given her.
"I am really pleased that the court has recognized that terminally ill patients should have more choice in the manner of their death," said Riggs.
"Most Americans want to die peacefully at home, surrounded by loved ones, not die in agony in a hospital," she said. "I feel the same way. If my cancer returns and I face intolerable suffering, I want the option to cut it short, and to die peacefully at home."
