fundamental rights

Lawmakers push HHS to monitor assisted suicide in hospices

• A bipartisan group of lawmakers signed a joint letter to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. requesting strict hospice reporting rules to prevent discrimination and coercion in medically assisted suicide.
• The letter specifically asks HHS and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to investigate whether insurance companies deny life-sustaining care while offering to cover physician-assisted suicide drugs instead.
• The lawmakers expressed concern that witness requirements for assisted suicide may fail to protect elderly patients from financial abuse, as witnesses could benefit from the patient's death through wills or life insurance.
• At least 14,446 Americans have died by physician-assisted suicide since 1997, according to a March report from the nonprofit Aging With Dignity.