The upper house has begun debating the controversial issue and is expected to vote on the measure on Tuesday. The lower house has already approved the bill that would allow doctors to help patients die and it only requires a simple majority in the 75-seat Senate to become law. We will be even more glad when it goes through this final stage. We are very confident this bill will become law. If passed, the Netherlands will be the only country to make the practice legal.
Someone has to be first.
There's nothing to be proud of and nothing to be ashamed of. If passed, the law will legalise a practice that has been carried out by Dutch doctors for more than two decades. It is intended to clear up a fuzzy area of law which has left open the possibility of doctors being prosecuted for murder. Latest figures from the DVES show there were 3,600 deaths from euthanasia or assisted suicide in the Netherlands in 1995. The Christian Democrats, the Socialists and the smaller Calvinist parties oppose the bill, but they have less than 30 seats in the upper chamber between them.