The Plenary of the Spanish Congress of Deputies approved this Thursday, March 18, the legalization of euthanasia with 202 votes in favor, 141 against and two abstentions. The votes against the law were from the Deputies of VOX and the Popular Party (PP). The Iberian country is the fourth to regulate assisted suicide in Europe and the 31st in palliative care.
The regulations will come into force three months after being published in the Official State Gazette (BOE) and establishes that the practice may be carried out to patients who request it and have a “serious, chronic and incapacitating condition or serious and incurable disease, causing intolerable suffering “.
The patient must have Spanish nationality, be at least 18 years of age, have a legal residence or a certificate of registration that proves that the duration of stay in Spanish territories has been greater than 12 months. The person also has to be “aware and conscious at the time of the application”.
They have hurt the heart of Spain
From the rostrum Lourdes Méndez Monasterio, Deputy of VOX deputy and member of the Political Network for Values, denounced the totalitarian character of the new law: “today is a day that will go down in the history of ignominy in Spain, today its plan is consummated of implanting the culture of discarding and death, […] this law was conceived and prepared by the social-communist government and approved in an antidemocratic and dictatorial way “.
She explained that during the legislative process the opinions of legal experts and academics critical of the initiative were ignored – among others the opinions of experts of the World Medical Association, the General Council of Physicians, the Madrid College of Physicians, the Spanish Society of Palliative Care, the Bioethics Committee and the Spanish Society of Psychiatry.
“You have opted for death instead of care. You have unleashed a very profound change, an attack directed at the heart of society and the health system; it is no longer the value of life that informs our legal system, but above all, the weakest and most vulnerable people will be left unprotected”, he said.
We will repeal it
Méndez Monasterio reported that they will file an appeal before the Constitutional Court, since the new law violates articles of the Magna Carta, especially Article 15 on the right to life, and they will request the suspension of the regulations until the sentence is produced.
And she warned: “we will not rest, we will protect the lives of all Spaniards and we will reverse this law, you can be sure of it; in our society it will be life that triumphs and not death. We will face it and sooner rather than later we will win”.
You can see here the forceful speech (in Spanish) of the deputy, delivered on behalf of the VOX bench in Congress.
The Assembly for Life will support the appeal before the Constitutional Court
The Assembly for Life, Dignity and Freedom, an entity founded in January this year and which brings together 140 associations, announced that it will support the interpellation of VOX before the Constitutional Court (TC).
