Latest Disability rights Stories

By Elaine Lies TOKYO (Reuters) - Kazuyo Uemura sat for nine months by her comatose mother's bed, finally reaching a wrenching conclusion to let nature take its course. "My mother was really active, so I knew being kept alive like that wasn't what she'd want, but we'd never talked about it," the Japanese housewife said of her 82-year-old parent. "I finally told the doctors to leave things to nature, but they made shocked faces, and I felt horribly guilty." Living wills, outlining...

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The Dutch government is furious after an Italian minister this week branded the country's euthanasia laws as akin to the policies of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, according to Dutch news agency ANP. Dutch Prime Minister Balkenende is expected to raise the matter with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi next week at a European summit, ANP said. "This is scandalous and unacceptable... it is not the way to get along in Europe," Balkenende said on Friday. Italian...

BEIJING (Reuters) - An adviser to China's parliament has suggested the country allows regions to "experiment" with euthanasia as a step toward legalizing mercy killing nationwide, Xinhua news agency said on Thursday. A survey done in several areas of the country showed more than 80 percent of people supported euthanasia for those with incurable, painful illness, with approval rates especially high among the elderly, Zhao Gongmin, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social...

LONDON (Reuters) - Campaigners opposed to moves to legalise euthanasia said on Tuesday that Britain should be giving terminally ill patients better palliative care instead of considering how to kill them. The newly formed Care Not Killing Alliance said it would fight a euthanasia bill currently in the House of Lords and any other attempts to legalise doctor-assisted suicide. Human rights lawyer Lord Joffe has introduced a private bill that would give seriously ill patients the option...

By Adam Tanner SACRAMENTO, California (Reuters) - Voters, not elected officials, should decide whether to make California the second state after Oregon to allow doctor-assisted suicide, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said on Tuesday. The Catholic governor made the remark a week after a key U.S. Supreme Court decision that has prompted state legislators to push anew for a change in California law to allow terminally ill patients to ask doctors to help end their lives. "I personally think...

By James Vicini WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration overstepped its authority when it barred doctors from helping terminally ill patients die in the only state that allows physician-assisted suicide, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday. In a stinging defeat for the administration, the high court ruled by a 6-3 vote that then-Attorney General John Ashcroft wrongly interpreted a federal law in 2001 to bar distribution of controlled drugs to assist suicides, disregarding...

By Adam Tanner SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A U.S. Supreme Court ruling backing Oregon's physician-assisted suicide law gives a major boost to a similar measure languishing in the California legislature since last year, lawmakers said on Tuesday. "I believe we will get this bill passed this year and signed by the governor," said Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, co-author of a law to allow state residents to obtain lethal medication if they had less than six months to live. Levine, a Democrat,...

By James ViciniWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration cannot stop doctors from helping terminally ill patients end their lives under the nation's only physician-assisted suicide law, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday.In a stinging defeat for the administration, the high court ruled on a 6-3 vote that then-Attorney General John Ashcroft in 2001 impermissibly interpreted federal law to bar distribution of controlled drugs to assist suicides, regardless of the Oregon law...

By James ViciniWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration cannot stop doctors from helping terminally ill patients end their lives under the nation's only physician-assisted suicide law, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday.By a 6-3 vote, the high court ruled that then-Attorney General John Ashcroft in 2001 impermissibly interpreted federal law to bar distribution of controlled drugs to assist suicides, regardless of the Oregon law authorizing it.In a stinging defeat for the...

By James ViciniWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration cannot stop doctors from helping terminally ill patients end their lives under the nation's only physician-assisted suicide law, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday.By a 6-3 vote, the high court ruled that then-Attorney General John Ashcroft in 2001 impermissibly interpreted federal law to bar distribution of controlled drugs to assist suicides, regardless of the Oregon law authorizing it.In a stinging defeat for the...