Editorial of the “World”. Recurrent, painful, but fundamental and rebellious to any Manichaeism, the question of the end of life is back on the agenda with the examination, Thursday, April 8, in the National Assembly, of the bill of the deputy Olivier Falorni “Giving the right to a free and chosen end of life”. Sixteen years after the Leonetti law, which had prohibited therapeutic relentlessness and recognized the patient’s right to refuse treatment; five years after the Claeys-Leonetti law, which allowed the patient to request a “Deep and continuous sedation until death”, the new text proposes to cross a course hitherto discarded in France, that which separates passive euthanasia from active euthanasia.
The Falorni bill provides for the possibility for a person “In the advanced or terminal phase of a serious and incurable disease (…) inflicting physical or psychological suffering on it which cannot be alleviated or which it deems unbearable ”, of “To have medical assistance allowing, through active assistance, a rapid and painless death”.
The parliamentary fate of this text is more than uncertain. The tabling of more than 3,000 amendments, mainly by its opponents, risks preventing its examination, which is limited to one day, within the framework of a “parliamentary niche”, where the deputies are masters of the agenda . Especially since the government believes that the health crisis is “Not an opportune time” for this debate.
A desired change in the law
Certainly, the pandemic and its daily procession of victims make the question of death more present and sensitive than in ordinary times. But the tragedies linked to Covid-19 do not make this discussion any less necessary, called for by a large number of elected officials of all stripes. In these times when the use of institutions by the executive tends to dangerously marginalize Parliament, it would be paradoxical for this debate to be stifled, while, according to several polls, a large majority of French people, including practicing Catholics, want a evolution of the law.
Supporters of the proposal debated Thursday denounce the hypocrisy of the legislation in force, which, according to them, invites the practice of masked euthanasia while claiming to maintain the ban. They highlight the right of everyone to choose their own death and stress that thousands of French people secretly exercise their “right to die with dignity” in France, or are forced to cross the Belgian or Swiss borders.
For their part, opponents of the text insist on the progress that remains to be made in the field of palliative care. They are concerned about the new social norm that active euthanasia could introduce and the risks associated with its application, permitted by the proposed law, to people unable to express themselves, in application of “Advance directives”.
It is a fact: death is an event over which individuals increasingly wish to exercise their freedom. Should the law, the guarantor of social life, nevertheless favor autonomy over the protection of the most vulnerable, to the point of accepting that we can actively help to die? It will take more than just a day of parliamentary debate to eventually achieve a new balance. A serious assessment of the 2016 law is needed. But anyone who has had to experience the unbearable suffering and the will to die of a loved one at the end of their life knows that denial is not an option.