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Hawaii became the seventh state to sign into law the Our Choice Act (aka Death with Dignity) on April 6, 2018. This was signed as an option available for end-of-life care with the understanding that "assisted suicide is not for everyone".
Taken from the Death with Dignity website:
Before your time is here, you might want to catch up on your legislation. Death with Dignity laws (aka physician-assisted dying or aid-in-dying laws) stem from the basic idea that it is the terminally ill people, not government and its interference, politicians and their ideology, or religious leaders and their dogma, who should make their end-of-life decisions and determine how much pain and suffering they should endure.
Death with Dignity statutes allow mentally competent adult state residents who have a terminal illness with a confirmed prognosis of having six or fewer months to live to voluntarily request and receive a prescription medication to hasten their inevitable, imminent death. By adding a voluntary option to the continuum of end-of-life care, these laws give patients dignity, control, and peace of mind during their final days with family and loved ones.
Five states and Washington, D.C., have Death with Dignity statutes:
- California (End of Life Option Act; approved in 2015, in effect from 2016)
- Colorado (End of Life Options Act; 2016)
- District of Columbia (D.C. Death with Dignity Act; 2016/2017)
- Hawaii (Our Care, Our Choice Act; 2018/2019)
- Maine (Death with Dignity Act; 2019)
- New Jersey (Aid in Dying for the Terminally Ill Act; 2019)
- New Mexico (Elizabeth Whitefield End of Life Options Act; 2021)
- Oregon (Death with Dignity Act; 1994/1997)
- Vermont (Patient Choice and Control at the End of Life Act; 2013)
- Washington (Death with Dignity Act; 2008)
Montana does not currently have a statute safeguarding physician-assisted death. In 2009, Montana’s Supreme Court ruled nothing in the state law prohibited a physician from honoring a terminally ill, mentally competent patient’s request by prescribing medication to hasten the patient’s death. Since the ruling, several bills have been introduced to codify or ban the practice, none of which have passed.
Read more here.
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