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QUEENSLAND legalised voluntary euthanasia today, becoming the last but one Australian state to do so.
The law, which passed 61-30 in the state parliament, allows people suffering from a disease or medical condition that is advanced, progressive and terminal to opt to have their lives ended.
Deputy Premier Steven Miles of the Labour Party said that the law would ease pain and suffering. “It has been a very considered debate,” he said.
But critics warned that a lack of funding for proper palliative care would put pressure on people to end their lives.
“Will this government provide a guarantee that people will get access to quality integrated palliative care services wherever they live in Queensland, when they have a terminal diagnosis, and not just in the last few months of life?” asked opposition MP Fiona Simpson.
Some Labour MPs agreed, with former nurse Joe Kelly arguing that the state should focus on improving palliative care instead.
Assisted dying legislation has been opposed by disability rights groups, which argue that vulnerable people will be under pressure to choose death rather than be seen as a burden on underfunded health services or their family.
Critics say that initially narrow limitations on circumstances have been gradually undermined in countries where euthanasia is legal, such as the Netherlands, which last year legalised the euthanising of children under 12 and ruled in 2019 that a doctor who had a woman held down and euthanised as she struggled to resist a lethal injection had acted in her interests, as she had previously expressed a wish for assisted dying when of sound mind.