URGENT ACTION ALERT

H.R. 2260,
The Pain Relief Promotion Act

MAY HAVE A HOUSE FLOOR VOTE IN EARLY OCTOBER

This is our chance to help stop euthanasia before it becomes embedded in American medicine and culture. Please urge your Representative to vote FOR H.R. 2260, the Pain Relief Promotion Act.

The Pain Relief Promotion Act would prohibit the use of federally controlled drugs for assisted suicide or euthanasia and would provide $25 million over five years to foster pain management and palliative care as positive alternatives to euthanasia.

KEY POINTS:

· On June 5, 1998, overturning an earlier policy determination by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno announced that the federal Controlled Substances Act establishes no uniform national policy against the use of federally regulated drugs for assisted suicide. Thus, she said, these drugs may be used to assist patients' suicides in any state which, like Oregon, allows the practice under state law.

· Under federal law and regulations, the use and prescription of certain narcotics and other dangerous drugs is generally prohibited unless a doctor with a special federal "registration" to prescribe them does so for a "legitimate medical purpose."

· In contrast, when it comes to marijuana, whose "medicinal use" has been legalized by referenda in a number of states, the Justice Department continues to maintain that it remains illegal under the Controlled Substances Act no matter what state law may say.

· Under Reno's ruling, the federal government facilitates the killing of patients in Oregon, by acknowledging their killing as "legitimate" and providing access to the lethal drugs needed to carry it out.

· A bill introduced last year to overturn the Reno decision and restore the original professional judgment of the DEA that killing a patient is not a "legitimate medical purpose" was opposed by the National Hospice Organization and other medical groups who said they feared it might inhibit doctors from prescribing appropriate pain relief. This year, however, the bill has been rewritten both to address this concern and to provide$25 million over five years to foster pain management and palliative care as positive alternatives to euthanasia, and the National Hospice Organization, American Medical Association, and many other medical groups have endorsed the new bill.

· By 64% to 31%, Americans say "no" when asked whether federal law should allow use of federally controlled drugs for the purpose of assisted suicide and euthanasia.