2025 brings flurry of assisted suicide bills in more than a dozen states

States across the country are charging ahead with efforts to legalize physician-assisted suicide despite longstanding ethical and moral concerns about the practice.

Already this year, bills have been introduced in more than a dozen states to legalize assisted suicide, according to a legislative tracker for Death With Dignity, a group that advocates nationally for its legalization. The states with pending efforts include Arizona, Missouri, Illinois, Florida, New York, Kentucky, Tennessee, Maryland and Delaware.

Assisted suicide – in which a doctor prescribes lethal drugs that a terminally ill patient self-administers to end his or her life – is currently legal in 10 states and Washington, D.C.  

Dubbed by proponents as “medical aid in dying,” the practice has sparked ethical concerns, including that assisting in a patient’s death is incompatible with a doctor’s job as a healer who should “do no harm” to their patients. Proponents argue it allows patients with terminal illness to die on their own terms, surrounded by loved ones, rather than forcing them to suffer. 

Besides the ethical concerns, opponents fear the practice could be expanded over time, as it has been in Canada – where assisted suicide is now the fifth-leading cause of death. Critics there also worry about how easily patients are able to end their lives.

In America, recent Gallup polling indicates mixed feelings on the issue: while 66% support allowing physician-assisted suicide, only 53% think the procedure is “morally acceptable.”  

There are also widely different views among religious and non-religious people: Gallup indicates that while 67% of those who “seldom or never attend religious services” believe assisted suicide is morally acceptable, only 29% of those who attend religious services weekly say the same.  

The debate appears likely to intensify as more states consider the practice. Earlier this month, Florida introduced House Bill 471, which would allow terminally ill adults with “mental capacity” to make a “fully informed decision” to obtain life-ending drugs from a physician.  

“The Legislature finds that every adult with mental capacity has the fundamental right of self-determination regarding decisions pertaining to his or her own health,” Florida’s bill reads, “and recognizes that for some faced with a terminal condition, prolonging life may result in intolerable pain and suffering.” Florida’s legislation mirrors that in many of the other states considering legalization, as bills often use language about a patient’s autonomy and freedom to end their suffering. 

While several states, such as Tennessee, New Hampshire, and Kentucky, have only introduced bills so far, others are actively advancing through legislatures. In Maryland, legislative hearings have been set for March 3 and 5 on an assisted suicide measure.  

Meanwhile, Montana is pushing back against the practice with a bill to eliminate legal protections for doctors who prescribe the life-ending “medications.”  

“Physician aid in dying is against public policy, and a patient’s consent to physician aid in dying is not a defense to a charge of homicide against the aiding physician,” Montana’s bill, which recently passed in the state Senate, notes. 

Lawmakers supporting that bill said that allowing assisted suicide is a “slippery slope” and could be used to target vulnerable groups, including people with disabilities.  

“It will just keep growing and growing,” said state Sen. Carl Glimm, the Daily Montanan reported.  

Another lawmaker, state Sen. Daniel Emrich, noted that taking lethal drugs is not a “peaceful way to go out,” as the assisted suicide advocates have suggested. 

“The drug cocktails they give them contain paralytics and these, without other drugs, will make them suffocate and die,” he said. “The reason they give them paralytics is to cover up these people would be flailing in place.” 

He also said allowing assisted suicide sends a dangerous message to sick patients: 

“We’re telling them they’re not worthy to be on this earth, that they should just go away because they’re inconvenient, that they have some disability or ailment or we just don’t want them anymore because they’re wasting away.”