In a historic ruling on May 12, the Constitutional Court of Colombia, with 6 votes in favor and 3 against, decriminalized medically assisted suicide for patients suffering from serious or incurable illnesses. With the decision, the country’s highest court expanded the citizens’ right to dignified death, which is enshrined in the constitution and which led to the decriminalization of euthanasia in 1997 and its subsequent regulation in 2015.
While Colombia had allowed euthanasia, medical professionals, family members, friends or anyone who encouraged or assisted someone to consider the option, risked a sentence of between 16 and 36 months in prison. Thursday’s ruling eliminated these punishments contemplated for assisted suicide in the Colombian penal code. Now, a person can assist a seriously ill person to decide on the matter without the risk of going to jail.
The resolution came as a response to a legal appeal filed by the Laboratory of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (DescLab), an organization of human rights lawyers. The DescLab argued that criminalizing those who assist people with suicide still violates their right to a dignified death and access to medical help.
?Ampliamos el #DerechoAMorirDignamente, la Corte despenalizó el suicidio medicamente asistido. Ahora las personas en Colombia tenemos cuatro mecanismos constitucionales para ejercer el derecho a morir dignamente. pic.twitter.com/9qXMxZ3swq
— DescLAB (@DescLABcol) May 11, 2022
According to official data, around 200 people have opted for euthanasia in Colombia since 1997. Meanwhile, according to statistics from the DescLAB, between January 2010 and August 2021, investigations were opened into some 127 cases for allegedly encouraging the procedure.
Euthanasia and assisted suicide are similar practices. In euthanasia, a doctor administers a life-ending drug to a patient to relieve their suffering. In assisted suicide, a patient self-administers the medicine and end their own life, with the prior support and supervision of a health professional.
The ruling establishes that for medically assisted suicide, patients must meet the standards already in place for euthanasia. These include that they must be diagnosed with an injury or serious or incurable disease which causes intense physical or mental pain they find incompatible with living a dignified life, and they must express their free, informed and unequivocal consent to complete suicide and get assistance from a doctor.
With this verdict, Colombia joins a short list of countries that allow “aid in dying” in some form or another, which includes the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Canada, Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, Austria, some states in Australia and the United States.
Likewise, Colombia, which was the first and only country in Latin America and the Caribbean region to have decriminalized euthanasia, now became the first country to allow medically assisted suicide.
