Incoming Archbishop of Canterbury blasts ‘unsafe’ assisted dying law with ex-nurse warning cancer patients may choose suicide over chemotherapy
New assisted suicide legislation is unsafe and could lead cancer patients to choose death over treatment, the Archbishop of Canterbury warned today.
Dame Sarah Mullally warned the bill was ‘unsafe’ and people’s decisions could be influenced by the poor quality of palliative and social care they receive.
The archbishop-elect, the current Bishop of London, is a former nurse and will become the first woman to lead the worldwide Anglican communion in January.
Speaking on an edition of BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, edited by former Prime Minister Theresa May, Dame Sarah said better care needed to be provided to the ‘most vulnerable’.
He also noted the lack of measures to prevent people who are not terminally ill being helped to die, saying: ‘I’m not sure any changes would make it safe.’
He added: ‘We are not funding palliative care properly. I worry that people may decide to have an assisted death because they don’t have the right kind of palliative care or the right social care.
‘I also have concerns that there is a group of people who have no choice in life; These are people who, because of inequality, are more likely to get cancer, be diagnosed late, and die from it.
‘My concern is that this group of people may be given options and because of other people’s value judgments they think that option is not chemotherapy but assisted dying and fighting for that (life).’
Dame Sarah Mullally warned the bill was ‘unsafe’ and people’s decisions could be influenced by the poor quality of palliative and social care they receive.
MPs paved the way for assisted dying to become legal in England and Wales in June, with a majority of 23 people backing the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill.
Criticism of the backbencher bill, sponsored by Labour’s Kim Leadbeater (R), has increased since the Commons vote; colleagues tabled hundreds of amendments designed to fix flaws in the draft.
MPs paved the way for assisted dying to become legal in England and Wales in June, with a majority of 23 people backing the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill.
The bill will only become law if both the House of Commons and the House of Lords agree on the final draft of the bill; This approval must be required before the current session of Parliament ends in the spring.
Criticism of the backbencher bill, sponsored by Labour’s Kim Leadbeater, has increased since the Commons vote; colleagues tabled hundreds of amendments designed to fix flaws in the draft.
Dame Sarah made history in October when she became the first woman to take on a leading role in the Church of England.
He was officially elected the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury at a traditional ceremony at Canterbury Cathedral in November, and will legally become Archbishop of Canterbury in January.
Justin Welby, the 105th archbishop of Canterbury, officially resigned in early January after announcing his intention to step down two months earlier over his failure to deal with a security scandal.
In his Christmas speech, he said assisted dying legislation and its “complexities” were challenging “our understanding of what it means to live and die well”.
