CV NEWS FEED // According to recent polling, the vast majority of voters in the Netherlands expressed approval of Parliament’s recent efforts to pass more increasingly aggressive laws in favor of assisted suicide.
According to a report from NL Times, 80% of voters in the Netherlands said they approved of Parliament’s current efforts to pass its D66 bill, which would allow people over 75 years old, “who feel their life is complete,” to seek “professional help” in dying “if they feel they’ve reached the end of a completed life.”
The Netherlands became the first country in the world to legalize euthanasia in 2001 according to a report from World Population Review. Current laws in the country allow assisted suicide for elderly people experiencing “normal degenerative conditions that accompany aging,” and children between twelve and 16 with parental consent.
The recently submitted version of the bill includes Council of State revisions to the 2020 version, which had a more lenient verification process for those seeking to end their lives.
The most recent amended verison of the D66 bill now requires individuals to undergo three meetings with an “end of life counselor” over the course of six months before the assisted suicide may take place.
Citing a Kieskompas poll of nearly 200,000 people, NL Times reported that “only 10 percent of respondents disagreed with the statement that people who consider their lives complete should be able to end their lives with professional help.”
NL Times also noted that the bill received support across all demographics: “Unlike with many other statements, gender, age, or education level made no difference in the amount of support.”
However, eight out of fifteen political parties currently represented in the Dutch House of Representatives have expressed opposition to the bill so far.
Deaths from euthanasia represented 5.1% of all deaths in the Netherlands in 2022.
“The statistics from the Netherlands are alarming, not only in terms of the number of lives lost to euthanasia, but also the widespread public support for relaxing the laws even further,” said Right to Life UK Spokesperson Catherine Robinson.
“Once euthanasia becomes permissible within a country, it appears that it does not take long for the culture to embrace and promote it,” she added.
