The Dutch Experience of Euthanasia
| Published date | 01 December 1998 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1467-6478.00107 |
| Date | 01 December 1998 |
| Author | Penney Lewis |
INTRODUCTION
Both proponents and opponents of the legalization of assisted suicide and
euthanasia rely on the ‘Dutch experience’ of euthanasia when advancing
their positions. Given its status as ‘the only country in the world in which
euthanasia, under specific circumstances, is legally permissible,’1the Dutch
experience has been both vilified and romanticized.
Euthanasia and Law in the Netherlands2by John Griffiths, Alex Bood,
and Heleen Weyers provides a valuable and exceptionally thorough and
detailed exegesis of the history, law, and practice in the Netherlands. By
setting out clearly the structure of the Dutch health care system and explain-
ing the context in which the elderly and terminally ill are cared for, the
authors provide much needed context against which their subsequent
presentation of the history of legal change in the Netherlands, the present
legal situation, and the evidence of past and current practice can be better
understood. Two other recent books, Otlowski’s Voluntary Euthanasia and
the Common Law,3and a collection of essays entitled Regulating How We
Die4also make thoughtful contributions to the debate over the use of the
Dutch experience. This debate must begin by exploring the legal basis of
euthanasia in the Netherlands in comparison with proposals for legalization
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© Blackwell Publishers Ltd 1998, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA
* Lecturer, School of Law and Centre of Medical Law and Ethics, King’s
College London, Strand, London WC2R 2LS, England
I am grateful to Andrew Grubb and Rosamund Scott for their constructive comments and
suggestions, and to Bastiaan Hoogendoorn for his help with translation.
The Dutch Experience of Euthanasia
PENNEY LEWIS*
Review Article
1J. Griffiths, A. Bood, H. Weyers, Euthanasia and Law in the Netherlands (1998) 15 (hereinafter
Netherlands).
2 id.
3 M. Otlowski, Voluntary Euthanasia and the Common Law (1997).
4L. Emanuel (ed.), Regulating How We Die: The Ethical, Medical, and Legal Issues Surrounding
Physician-Assisted Suicide (1998).
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