Researchers Say People With Eating Disorders are Dying from Assisted Suicide

A recent column in The Wall Street Journal highlights how people with eating disorders are dying from assisted suicide in states and countries where the practice is legal.

Alexander Raikin with the Ethics and Public Policy Center writes:

We have Oregon’s 2021 annual report on assisted suicide and correspondence with Colorado’s Vital Statistics Program, published in a 2024 peer-reviewed article by Chelsea Roff, which confirm that anorexia has been reported as the primary qualifying illness for assisted suicide. We also have a case study by Jennifer Gaudiani—an eating-disorder specialist and assisted suicide clinician in Colorado—on two of her patients with eating disorders who were prescribed assisted suicide.

The 2024 peer-reviewed article he cited found, “Assisted dying for reasons solely related to an eating disorder (ED) has occurred in multiple countries, including those which restrict the practice to individuals with a terminal condition.”

Researchers also identified at least 60 patients with eating disorders who underwent assisted suicide between 2012 and 2024. Although these people were supposed to have illnesses that were terminal, incurable, or untreatable, researchers said gaps in the data on assisted suicide raised “substantial concerns about oversight and public safety” and that in many cases the reasons for justifying assisted suicide were invalid.

Experience has shown that assisted suicide doesn’t help people who are sick and dying.

In parts of the U.S. where physician-assisted suicide is legal, insurance companies have refused to pay for patients’ medical care, but have offered to cover assisted suicide drugs.

Patients in Europe and Canada reportedly have been denied care or actively euthanized as a result of assisted suicide laws.

Stories like these are part of the reason why Family Council has strongly opposed assisted suicide legislation in Arkansas.

Being pro-life means believing innocent human life is sacred from conception until natural death.

Just like abortion, euthanasia and assisted suicide violate the sanctity of innocent human life.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.