TOP FAQs
DO I QUALIFY FOR AID IN DYING MEDICATION?
Only a clinician can make that adetermination. Minimally, you must:
- be an adult with a clinically-confirmed terminal diagnosis and six-month prognosis
- have AND maintain sound mental capacity
- have the physical capacity to take the medication
Each law carries additional requirements for qualification. Your aid-in-dying provider will guide you through the process.
WHAT ABOUT DEMENTIA OR LONG-TERM CHRONIC DISEASES?
This is, by far, the most frequently asked question about aid-in-dying laws. In most peoples’ minds, it’s seems a simple matter to include people who do not want to suffer a long, slow decline with dementia or chronic illness.
It’s complicated. As of 2025, U.S. aid-in-dying laws only apply to people with a clinically-confirmed terminal illness who are capable of making their own healthcare decisions.
Background: This is not simple. The legal and ethical considerations between making your own decisions and having another person make decisions on your behalf are vastly different and extremely complicated. Our legal and medical systems have not determined that our current selves should have complete agency over our future selves. A medically-aided death and a euthanasia death are not the same. Active euthanasia is not legal anywhere in the United States for human beings.
Other countries have more progressive views. As an example, in Canada, people can elect to end their lives through their law, or ask a physician to do it for them, as their dementia takes hold. The Canadian law was established based upon a fundamental principle in their constitution: that being a Canadian citizen’s right to “life, liberty, and privacy of the person.” Privacy of the person is a legally defensible concept under Canadian law and reinforces the right of a person to make autonomous decisions.
The United States Constitution guarantees our right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” The pursuit of happiness” is not legally defensible, as illustrated by the many ways we cannot access the kinds of things we think will bring us happiness, such as being able to end our lives should we suffer from dementia.
DOES MEDICARE OR PRIVATE INSURANCE COVER THE COST OF AID IN DYING?
Short answer: Medicare does not. People have to check with their private insurance to see if it is covered.
Background: There is a federal prohibition against the use of medicare dollars for assisted dying. See the Code of Federal Regulations, 42 USC 138 for more information. Some, but not all, state insurance programs will cover the cost even when Medicare will not. In states that have a law, regardless of what kind of insurance people have, they should check with their insurance providers to learn what may be covered. For states that do not have a law, it would be up to policy makers in the state to determine whether there would be coverage should a law eventually pass.
HOW DOES THIS AFFECT LIFE INSURANCE POLICIES?
Short answer: Aid-in-dying laws have no impact on life insurance policy payouts after the death of a person who uses the medication.
Background: One of the most elegant parts of a Death with Dignity law is the language addressing what it is and what it isn’t. Every aid-in-dying law contains language similar to this excerpt from the Oregon law:
Nothing in [this Act] shall be construed to authorize a physician or any other person to end a patient’s life by lethal injection, mercy killing or active euthanasia. Actions taken in accordance with [this Act] shall not, for any purpose, constitute suicide, assisted suicide, mercy killing or homicide, under the law.
Simply put, aid in dying is not viewed as suicide by the law nor the medical system. This simple yet powerful language prevents insurance companies from refusing to pay out on a life insurance policy.
WHY DON’T WE JUST CALL THIS SUICIDE? AFTER ALL, THE PATIENT IS TAKING MEDICATION TO END THEIR LIFE. THAT’S SUICIDE.
Short answer: We can argue philosophically until the cows come home that using a medication to hasten death is self-killing (the meaning of the word suicide). As illustrated in the question about life insurance, neither the law nor medical systems view a patient’s death under the law as a suicide.
Background: While this question usually comes from the opposition, it is also asked by people who support aid in dying. What we understand in our society as suicide can be the result of mental illness or a rational decision to end one’s life prematurely. Suicide is typical viewed as a preventable event, or something that, if avoided, would mean the person could go on living. The fact is, terminally ill people sometimes choose to hasten their death in states that do not have an aid-in-dying law. So it isn’t always the case that a person could go on living if they did not end thier own life.
There are many practical reasons assisted dying is not the same as a suicide, which is why each law addresses an aid-in-dying kind of death with very specific language..
ISN’T THIS WHAT HOSPICE ALREADY DOES?
Hospice care is palliative in nature and focuses on supporting symptom control to sustain quality of life for a patient with terminal illness as much as possible. It’s a mistaken belief that hospice “kills” patients.
Background: It’s a common, unfounded belief that hospice either kills people or hastens their death. This is an ignorant perception and may relate to the fact that many people pursue treatment up to within weeks or even days of death, going on hospice just before they die.
Another common misconception about hpspice enrollment is that it means a patient has “given up.” A decision to enroll in hospice is not at all about giving up. It is about a patient recognizing they have limited time due to a grave illness, and choosing to focus on quality of life for the time they have remaining. That’s not giving up.
WHAT ABOUT THE NETHERLANDS? AREN’T WE GOING TO HEAD DOWN THE SAME SLIPPERY SLOPE?
Short answer: What about the Netherlands? Other countries have different and often more progresive laws than we have. What happens in the Netherlands has no bearing on United States law.
Background: This is a favorite diversion of opposition’s illogical arguments. “What about…?” questions involving other countries’ laws are used to plant seeds of doubt and persuade people that if we pass an aid-in-dying law, then the sky will start falling. Asking a question like this one, which really has no answer and no place in the United States movement, causes people to think there could be something wrong, and it therefore leads to hesitation. Don’t be drawn in by illogical questions from the opposition.
Note: In a slippery slope argument, a course of action is rejected because, with little or no evidence, one insists that it will lead to a chain reaction resulting in an undesirable outcome. The slippery slope involves an acceptance of a succession of events without direct evidence that this course of events will happen.
WHAT ABOUT [THAT LADY FROM CALIFORNIA] OR [FILL IN THE BLANK]?
Short answer: Often, “What about…?” questions are used by opposition to plant seeds of doubt and create smokescreens that divert attention away from the facts.
Background: The most commonly asked “What about…?” questions involve misinformation and skewed allegations made by people who morally oppose aid-in-dying laws.
ISN’T THIS JUST A WAY FOR HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANIES TO SAVE MONEY? Or DOESN’T THIS TARGET VULNERABLE PEOPLE, LIKE THE ELDERLY, DISABLED, UNINSURED, AND SO FORTH?
Short answer: Not even a little bit. Insurance companies do not determine standards of care and are not involved in the physician-patient relationship. The fact is, these laws have been in place in the United States since 1997 and continue to work exactly as intended and exactly for whom intended.
Background: Only people with a terminal disease, a six-month prognosis, and the ability to make their own informed decisions may initiate the conversation with their own physicians. Aid-in-dying is a patient-directed decision.
This kind of a question is, again, an example of smoke-and-mirrors misinformation to spread doubt and fear with those who don’t have the time to research the facts. Opposition counts on people believing something is wrong or questionable so they will hesitate.
An argument like this is based on the mistaken notion that insurance companies dictate the course of care for a patient. This is a spin-off argument from allegations opposition makes about how these laws will target vulnerable populations.
WHAT GOES ON THE DEATH CERTIFICATE?
Short answer: That varies by law. Some laws mandate that the underlying disease be listed as cause of death. Others laws are silent, leaving the decision up to the attending physician. In these instances, physicians are encouraged to list the underlying disease, just as they do when someone dies under terminal sedation.
Since the laws contain language prohibiting the use of the terms “suicide” or “assisted suicide”, neither of these can be listed on a death certificate.
Background: The death certificate is a point of contention with opposed medical providers, who argue that mandating what to put on the death certificate “forces a physician to lie.” Opposing physicians consistently side-step the question of why, when someone dies under terminal sedation, that is not put on a death certificate.
This is another red herring discussion. The fact is, it is unlikely that an opposing physician will be tasked with completing a death certificate for a person who died using the law. The task of initiating, completing, and filing the death certificate typically falls to the attending physician who prescribed the medication.
Disclosing information on a public document related to a person’s healthcare decisions, such as on a death certificate, is inappropriate and likely constitutes a privacy violation.