Some Dutch people seeking euthanasia cite autism or ID

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Several people with autism and intellectual disabilities have been legally euthanized in the Netherlands in recent years because they said they could not lead normal lives, researchers have found.

The cases included five people younger than 30 who cited autism as either the only reason or a major contributing factor for euthanasia, setting an uneasy precedent that some experts say stretches the limits of what the law originally intended.

In 2002, the Netherlands became the first country to allow doctors to kill patients at their request if they met strict requirements, including having an incurable illness causing “unbearable” physical or mental suffering.

Between 2012 and 2021, nearly 60,000 people were killed at their own request, according to the Dutch government’s euthanasia review committee. To show how the rules are being applied and interpreted, the committee has released documents related to more than 900 of those people, most of whom were older and had conditions including cancer, Parkinson’s and ALS.

Irene Tuffrey-Wijne, a palliative care specialist at Britain’s Kingston University, and her colleagues reviewed the documents to see how Dutch doctors were dealing with euthanasia requests from people with autism or with lifelong mental impairments. They published their findings in the journal BJPsych Open in May.

Among the 900 people with publicly posted case files, 39 of them were autistic and/or intellectually disabled. A handful were elderly, but 18 of them were younger than 50.

Many of the patients cited different combinations of mental problems, physical ailments, diseases or aging-related difficulties as reasons for seeking euthanasia. Thirty included being lonely as one the causes of their unbearable pain. Eight said the only causes of their suffering were factors linked to their intellectual disability or autism — social isolation, a lack of coping strategies or an inability to adjust their thinking.

“There’s no doubt in my mind these people were suffering,” Tuffrey-Wijne said. “But is society really OK with sending this message, that there’s no other way to help them and it’s just better to be dead?”

Other countries, including Belgium, Canada and Colombia, have legal euthanasia, but the Netherlands is the only one that shares detailed information about potentially controversial deaths, providing the best window into emerging trends in assisted dying. Still, its records are limited to what doctors disclose. So there could be other factors that weren’t released or cases where the patient’s autism or intellectual disabilities weren’t noted.

Because the committee releases only select records, it’s also impossible to know the true number of people with autism or intellectual disabilities killed at their own request.

Among the eight patients cited by researchers were an autistic man in his 20s. His record said “the patient had felt unhappy since childhood,” was regularly bullied and “longed for social contacts but was unable to connect with others.” The man, who was not named, chose euthanasia after deciding that “having to live on this way for years was an abomination.”

Simon Baron-Cohen, director of Cambridge University’s Autism Research Centre, said it was “abhorrent” that people with autism were being euthanized without being offered further support.

He noted that many autistic people struggle with depression, which could compromise their ability to make a lawful request to die. He also said an autistic person asking to die might not grasp the complexity of the situation.

The article is reporting only on the people who were actually killed at their own request.

It must be at your own request - you can't request it on behalf of anyone else. That also excludes a number of eligible applicants

The problem is some people may be requesting it because, for example as cited above, they have no friends, or no resources to be independent successfully. Apparently some of these people are being granted euthanasia when, theoretically their problems are fixable.

I am not in anyway criticizing the policy or the Dutch people. I believe people have the right to die.

I would prefer our world would celebrate differences rather than isolating some to the point they would rather die.