Eating disorders used as grounds for assisted suicide

Cases of euthanasia and assisted suicide for eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa have been documented in multiple countries, a new study has revealed.

Researchers found that between 2012 and 2024, at least 60 patients with eating disorders received medical help to kill themselves in Belgium, the Netherlands, and the United States.

In the British Isles different proposals for introducing assisted suicide laws have been put forward at Westminster, Holyrood, and the Dáil Éireann, as well as in Jersey and on the Isle of Man.

Depression

According to the study, in the US patients with eating disorders were prescribed lethal drugs based on the controversial “pseudo-diagnostic” label of “terminal anorexia”.

Compassionate care involves consistent, effective treatment — not facilitating suicide.

In Belgium and the Netherlands, patients with eating disorders were considered eligible for euthanasia or assisted suicide on the grounds that their condition was deemed by medics to be ‘hopeless’ or ‘untreatable’.

Of the nineteen case notes available for analysis, all were women, one third were under 30, and 89 per cent exhibited depressive symptoms.

Authors Chelsea Roff and Dr Catherine Cook-Cottone said: “The idea that patients with eating disorders are untreatable, treatment-resistant, or unable to recover has no place in medicine.”

Care not killing

Over 100 clinical practitioners, academics, organisations, and other experts are calling on governments around the world to legally prevent “eating disorders from being considered qualifying conditions for assisted suicide”.

Signatories to the joint statement against assisted suicide for eating disorders said: “We categorically reject the argument that assisted suicide is a form of compassionate care for individuals with eating disorders.

“Compassionate care involves consistent, effective treatment — not facilitating suicide.”

In a letter to The Daily Telegraph earlier this year, Claire Macdonald of My Death, My Decision claimed that permitting assisted suicide “for conditions such as anorexia” would be the mark of a “mature democracy”.

British Isles

At Westminster, Peers are expected to debate Lord Falconer of Thoroton’s Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults Bill in the coming months, which aims to allow assisted suicide for those believed to have less than six months to live.

Liam McArthur MSP has introduced a Bill to Holyrood to enable people in Scotland deemed to be terminally ill to get help to kill themselves.

Last month, Manx politicians forged ahead with plans to legalise assisted suicide on the island, and Jersey’s parliamentarians recently requested its own government bring forward draft legislation on so-called ‘assisted dying’.

In Ireland, a Bill to legalise state-sponsored suicide and euthanasia has been launched in the Dáil Éireann.