Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
AMA Opts To Continue Reviewing Its Opposition To Physician-Assisted Dying
The Washington Post: American Medical Association To Keep Reviewing Its Opposition To Assisted Death
A recommendation that the American Medical Association maintain its opposition to medically assisted death was rejected Monday, with delegates at the AMA's annual meeting in Chicago instead voting for the organization to continue reviewing its guidance on the issue. Following a debate on whether the nation’s most prominent doctors’ group should revise its Code of Medical Ethics, the House of Delegates voted by a margin of 56 to 44 percent to have the AMA’s Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs keep studying the current guidance. That position, adopted a quarter-century ago, labels the practice “physician-assisted suicide” and calls it “fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer.” (Bever, 6/11)
Modern Healthcare: AMA Could Be Reconsidering Stance On Physician-Assisted Suicide
The issue was one of the more contentious items discussed during the first day of voting for the AMA's governing body. The nation's leading physician organization was considering adopting recommendations from the AMA's Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs that concluded the current definition of physician-assisted suicide within the body's Code of Medical Ethics should not be changed. The AMA's current policy on physician-assisted suicide is that it is "incompatible with the physician's role as healer." A study two years in the making looked at two resolutions that requested the AMA replace the term "physician-assisted suicide" with "aid in dying", and that the group should take a neutral stance on the practice of aid in dying. (Johnson, 6/11)
