As Holyrood examines Liam McArthur’s Assisted Dying Bill, the Scottish Council on Human Bioethics warns that shifting from “assisted suicide” to “assisted dying” masks deeper ethical, social and medical consequences.

As Liam McArthur MSP’s Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill continues to be considered by the Scottish Parliament, it is maybe appropriate to ask why this Bill mentions ‘assisted dying’ instead of ‘assisted suicide’ as in the late Ms. Margo MacDonald MSP’s 2015 Assisted Suicide (Scotland) Bill. What was the aim of some of those behind this new terminology?

Perhaps, the first reason is that ‘assisted dying’ portrays a more passive perspective than suicide, as if death is taking its course. But this may be mistaken since, according to Mr. McArthur’s Bill, all persons who are ‘terminally ill’ (an imprecise term) could ask for their lives to be ended with assistance even if they have many months or even years to live, which is clearly a case of assisted suicide.

The second reason may be to conceal what is really intended. For instance, many amongst the general public may believe that the new legalisation would enable doctors to interrupt life-support machines, when these become futile, or to provide effective pain-killing drugs, in the context of palliative care, to address suffering. But, again, all this is already legal.

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A third underlying motivation for using the ‘passive’ terminology of ‘assisted dying’........

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