Assisted dying will exacerbate inequalities for minorities says expert

A University of Essex legal expert has warned MPs the proposed Assisted-Dying Bill has the potential to exacerbate existing health care inequalities for minorities.

Dr Rees Johnson, of Essex Law School, appeared before the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Dying Well last week where he raised concerns about the current state of pain assessment and management among ethnic minorities, and the lack of equitable access to good palliative care.

Dr Johnson, whose research focuses on the racial and cultural contexts of assisted death reform, was one of three experts invited to speak at the APPG meeting, which was attended by Kim Leadbeater, who has sponsored the Bill being put before Parliament.

He said: “My key concern is that without structural reforms in pain assessment and management and equitable access to good quality care provision at the end of life, assisted suicide risks becoming an inadequate ‘solution’ for those suffering from systemic healthcare failures.”

The APPG, which is made up MPs and members of the House of Lords, is opposed to the legalisation of assisted dying in the UK, instead suggesting that advancements in medicines and treatments mean palliative care has become more comfortable and pain more manageable for patients.

During last week’s session in the Commons, Dr Johnson raised several concerns which included:

• How the Bill allows doctors to suggest the subject of assisted suicide despite ethnic minorities’ tendency to choose life preserving treatments even when there is no hope of recovery.
• Existent disparities in end-of-life communication experienced by ethnic minority patients and how poor communication regarding prognosis and treatment options results in delayed referrals to hospice and other end-of-life caring provisions and how this hinders end-of-life planning. The impact of this means that ethnic minorities may feel that assisted suicide is their only choice because lack of timely information.
• Safeguarding individual autonomy but lacks the cultural competency to adequality address abuse or coercion arising from collective or family-driven decision-making processes, typical amongst ethnic minority groups and how this raises concerns about abuse and coercion especially where family members can sign requests for assisted suicide as proxies.
• Families being unable to bring actions where negligence has occurred because the bill states that providing assistance to a person to end their own life in accordance with this Act does not give rise to any civil liability.

MPs will get the chance to vote on the Bill for the first-time on Friday.