Report reveals Vermont assisted suicide deaths quadrupled over two-year period

A recently released report from the Vermont Department of Health indicates that the number of assisted suicide deaths in the state has more than quadrupled in the last two years. 

Per the report, there were 84 “reportable events” between July 1, 2021 and June 30, 2023, though the report later clarifies that 72 of those 85 were actually via assisted suicide, while the other deaths were caused by the underlying disease or another cause. Seventy-three percent (73%) of the people who chose assisted suicide did so because they had cancer.

In contrast, the state’s previous report issued in January 2022 revealed 17 assisted suicide deaths between July 1, 2019 and June 30, 2021. There have been 203 assisted suicide deaths in total since it was first legalized in the state in 2013. However, per law, the state of Vermont lists all of these deaths as “natural” on a death certificate, and notes the cause as the underlying disease that prompted the person to seek assisted death.

Though the number of assisted suicide deaths in the state has skyrocketed, lawmakers are continually looking to loosen the reins. In 2022, lawmakers legalized telemed assisted suicide appointments, which allowed a physician to sign off on a patient’s request to die without ever meeting that patient face-to-face. Last May, the state passed a bill allowing non-residents to come to the state to receive assisted suicide. Lynda Bluestein, the Connecticut woman who pushed for Vermont legislators to change the law, ended her life via lethal injection in the state last week. 

READ: Study: Assisted suicide can be painful, prolonged and inhumane

Mary Beerworth, executive director of Vermont Right to Life, has warned that legalizing such “death tourism” could have a snowball effect on the status of assisted suicide in the country.

“Remove the residency requirement on enough states that have assisted suicide laws, and you’ve pretty much got the whole United States,” she told the National Catholic Register last year.

Assisted suicide is currently allowed in 11 states, including California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, and the District of Columbia.

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