Polls & Research

French Support Doctor-Assisted Suicide

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - The vast majority of people in France would support legislation to allow a doctor to end the life of a person with an incurable disease and enduring unbearable suffering, if this person requests it, according to a poll by Ifop published in Paris Match. 91 per cent of respondents would be at least partly in favour of enacting such a law.

In November 2004, France’s National Assembly endorsed legislation which legalized "passive euthanasia." This concept allows doctors to withdraw life-sustaining medication from patients, but not to, for instance, administer poisons. Assisted suicide or "active euthanasia" occurs when an individual who is not physically capable of ending his or her own life requests the help of a physician to do so.

Assisted suicide based on medical grounds is legal in Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Switzerland, and the state of Oregon in the United States. It is not legal in France.

On Mar. 19, Chantal Sebire, a French woman suffering from a visible face tumour, was found dead in her home, apparently after taking an overdose of barbiturates. The 52-year-old Sebire had been denied a request to end her life by a French court earlier this year. She claimed she deserved the right to die to alleviate the "atrocious suffering" caused by the incurable tumour, which had completely deformed her face, and caused her to lose her eyesight and the senses of smell and taste.

Jean Leonetti, a member of the governing Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) party, wrote the passive euthanasia law in 2004. On Mar. 20, Luc Chatel, a spokesman for the government of French president Nicolas Sarkozy, said that Leonetti will review the legislation and see "if there is now the will to go further than the law of 2005," adding, "We will have to act quickly, because exceptional cases like that of Chantal Sebire are occurring regularly."

Polling Data

Are you personally in favour or against enacting a law that would authorize a doctor to end the life of a person with an incurable disease and causing unbearable suffering, if this person requests it?

Completely in favour	51%
Somewhat in favour	40%
Somewhat against	6%
Completely against	3%

Source: Ifop / Paris Match
Methodology: Telephone interviews with 956 French adults, conducted on Mar. 20 and Mar. 21, 2008. No margin of error was provided.