There is much debate in the UK and abroad around whether the law
should be changed to license doctors to prescribe lethal drugs to assist terminally
ill patients to commit suicide. Here, Sir Graeme Catto argues that terminally ill
mentally competent adults should be able to choose the time and place of their
death. Opposing him, Baroness Ilora Finlay argues that both the Assisted Suicide
(Scotland) Bill and Lord Falconer’s private member’s bill in the House of Lords
endanger patients’ safety and require doctors to assess patients against criteria that
cannot be verified.
