Voluntary assisted dying continues to gain ground in Australia, where all but two major states have introduced bills to allow terminally ill patients to receive voluntary assisted dying services.
In general, the legislation does not automatically obligate Catholic hospitals and aged-care facilities to provide voluntary assisted dying. But the latest Queensland Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill, which the Queensland Parliament is preparing to vote on, is different.
FRANCIS SULLIVAN
Chair of Catholic Social Services Australia
“The legislation as it currently stands means that a doctor who will provide voluntary assisted dying can come into the hospital unannounced, can effectively trespass onto the hospital, and can administer to the patient the lethal drug. And this can happen unbeknownst to the hospital.”
The Catholic Church has staunchly defended its position against voluntary assisted dying. In a 2020 document on the topic, titled “The Good Samaritan,” the Vatican responded to the argument that euthanasia is a form of compassion.
CARD. LUIS LADARIA
Prefect, Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith
September 22, 2020
“It's a type of compassion not accompanied by truth nor by respect for human life in all stages of its existence. This type of compassion is unjust, incorrect.”
FRANCIS SULLIVAN
Chair of Catholic Social Services Australia
“Staff that work in our hospitals work there because they are committed to the ethos of the hospital, and they are supportive, and they don't want to be placed in the situation where their personal conscience is in conflict. And secondly, they agree with us that we exist in the public and the private hospital systems of Australia to provide compassionate care to all, in all circumstances.”
The Queensland Parliament will debate and vote on the bill in mid-September. If approved, it would undermine private institutions' conscientious objection to voluntary assisted dying.
FRANCIS SULLIVAN
Chair of Catholic Social Services Australia
“The general feeling is that there is quite widespread support for the legislation per se, but we do get the impression that a lot of the members of the parliament don't want to place the Catholic hospitals and the Catholic aged-care homes in this conflict, and they would be open, we hope, to an amendment of the current bill.”
Sullivan says Catholic Social Services Australia is pressing the government to close that loophole, so hospital staff are not placed in a position of conflict of conscience.
CT
