State: 111 terminally ill end lives under new California law
SAN DIEGO — California health officials reported Tuesday that 111 terminally ill people took drugs to end their lives in the first six months after a 2016 law made the option legal in the nation’s most populous state.
The data was part of the California Department of Public Health’s first report on the law since it went into effect June 9, 2016.
According to the data generated from forms doctors were required to submit between June 9 and Dec. 31, 2016, a total of 191 people received life-ending drugs after being diagnosed with having less than six months to live and 111 people took them and died. Another 21 individuals died before taking the drugs. The outcomes of 59 others who received the prescriptions were not reported by their doctors within the six-month period, according to the report.
Of those who died, 87 per cent were 60 years old or older, most were white, college educated, receiving hospice or palliative care and had health insurance, either provided by the state or private carriers. The median age was 73, and the majority had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, according to the report. A total of 173 doctors reported prescribing life-ending drugs for their patients.