More people obtained prescriptions for life-ending medication under Oregon's Death With Dignity law last year than in 2023, but fewer actually died.
And fewer people came from out of state to obtain prescriptions, despite concerns that Oregon was inviting a grim form of medical tourism.
The new figures were released Thursday by the Oregon Health Authority, which compiles data on patient prescription requests and deaths under Oregon’s 27-year-old law. The law permits physicians, at the request of terminally ill patients, to prescribe medications that will end the patients’ lives.
The agency’s annual report on physician-assisted dying comes two years after the state dropped its requirement that only Oregonians could use the law, sparking widespread attention to the potential for “death tourism.”
The report suggests those fears haven’t yet come to pass, although it does show a new high in the number of people using the law.
The report also comes as state lawmakers consider the biggest revision to the law in its history. Senate Bill 1003 would make it so not just medical doctors but physician assistants and nurse practitioners could oversee the procedure of administering the lethal ingestion. It also would cut the required standard waiting period of 15 days to 48 hours.
The bill is supported by proponents of assisted-dying but is strongly opposed by the Oregon Medical Association, which said the legislation is too liberal and would push the state toward what amounts to allowing “euthanasia.”
Oregon was the first state to legalize assisted dying, and has since been joined by nine other states and Washington, D.C.
According to the state, those who died under the law last year were typically in their mid-70s, White, and had at least some college education, and most had been diagnosed with serious illnesses, such as cancer or Lou Gehrig’s disease. They said they feared losing their autonomy and no longer being able to experience activities that gave them pleasure. And about 9 percent, a new high, cited the financial implications of medical treatment in requesting lethal medication. None were uninsured.
According to the agency, 607 patients received lethal prescriptions in 2024, roughly an 8 percent increase from the previous year. The agency said 376 people are reported to have died under the law last year, a 2.6 percent decline from 2023.
As far as the differences, “we’re talking about pretty small numbers of people here,” Tom Jeanne, M.D., the Oregon Health Authority’s deputy state health officer and deputy state epidemiologist, told The Lund Report. “There’s going to be some variability from year to year.”
But opponents point to the steady growth in numbers of people requesting lethal medication — fewer than 100 people a year did so before 2011 — and say the system of physician-assisted suicide does a disservice to patients.
“A death request is often a plea for help, but legalizing assisted suicide may allow an option to die to transform into a duty to die,” said Dr. Sharon Quick, President of Physicians for Compassionate Care Education Foundation, in a prepared statement. “No one, including health care professionals, should be given god-like power to decide which vulnerable lives are no longer worthwhile because of the disability of terminal illness or psychological distress over disabilities associated with terminal decline.”
The most prominent diagnosis of patients who died under the law last year was cancer, though the percentage of patients diagnosed with cancer declined almost 10 percentage points from 2023, to about 57 percent. Another 15 percent were diagnosed with a neurological disease, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, and roughly 11 percent had a heart or circulatory disease.
The figures show that 63 people, or 21.6 percent of those who died last year under the law, didn’t ingest the lethal medication in the presence of a health care provider or volunteer, suggesting they took the fatal dose when they were alone. That’s more than a one-third increase from the previous year.
Financial considerations play a small but growing role in the decision by terminally ill patients to request prescriptions of lethal medication, according to the OHA data. In 2024, 35 of the 376 patients who died under the law, or 9.3 percent, cited concerns about the cost of continuing medical treatment. That’s a small but statistically significant increase from the previous years. From 1998 to 2022, about 5.1 percent expressed financial concerns, the agency reported.
The agency does not track all the circumstances surrounding the use of lethal medications. For example, the agency received information about complications in only 121 of the 376 reported deaths. Specifically, the agency said 112 people last year had no complications, such as seizures, after taking the lethal dose. Nine had some form of difficulty, such as regurgitating the medication. The agency said it has no information about complications for 255 of the people who died last year.
Patient death figures also aren’t complete, as the Health Authority compiles its figures by collating physicians’ reports with death certificates. In some cases, patients don’t take the lethal medication, die of other causes before they take it, or die in other states. Some people who received the prescription for lethal medication in 2024 died after the end of the year, or are still living.
This article is biased, with mainly groups in opposition quoted. The reality is that in 28 years DwD has shown no "slippery slope". The slight increase in use is due to more people becoming aware of the law as similar laws are adopted and debated in more states and countries. The claim that “A death request is often a plea for help"is only true in the sense that people in late stages of terminal illness make their "dignified, better death" request so they can die peacefully, while cognizant to say goodbye and drift off to sleep to die; so yes they are making a plea to die. We will all die, but most of us do not want a prolonged, suffering death. There is no "duty to die"; the patient has to make a verbal and written request themself.
Under this bill, no one would be given "god like powers" to determine the life or death of a person, as long as the requirement for the person to clearly state their request to use DwD. They already would have a qualifying diagnosis from a doctor to be eligible. The PA or NP would merely allow patients in hospice programs, or in rural locations without doctors, to be able to have the practitioner they have a relationship with to help them with medical aide in dying.
Additionally, Death with Dignity is NOT "assisted suicide". It is Medical Aide in Dying, for those already at the end of life.
Mental health treatment cannot do much when a person is in the dying process. If the person chooses, they can seek a chaplain. If they believe a god would not require them to suffer, or do not believe in a god, their rights should be respected to have a peaceful death.
The question is: will Oregonians be given the right to know if a facility that treats them when they are terminally ill will allow them to use DwD, or will they have to be moved while very ill and frail elsewhere to use the law? Will patients seeking DwD in rural ares with no medical doctors around have to move hundreds of miles to die peacefully and humanely?
The DwD law was passed by voters years ago, but some groups have fought and feared it since. Yet there is a bigger and bigger movement toward the right to humane deaths at the end of life. We are all going to die, and there are limits to what can be done in late stage cancer and other conditions.