Thu May 18, 2023 – 3:20 pm EDT
(LifeSiteNews) — California has backed down on enforcing a law requiring medical practitioners to participate in physician-assisted suicides against their will and has agreed to pay $300,000 to the Christian medical professionals who took the state to court.
California legalized assisted suicide in 2015 with the End of Life Option Act, under which physicians were able to opt out of participation in, and could not be punished for, “refusing to inform” a patient about his “right” to assisted suicide or for refusing make a referral to a more willing physician.
However, in October 2021, Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law SB 380, which states that “participating” in assisted suicide remains “voluntary” but requires refusing physicians to refer patients to someone else and defines “participation” so narrowly as to effectively compel participation in the practice, according to Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which filed a lawsuit against the law on behalf of the 16,000-member Christian Medical & Dental Associations (CMDA) and Dr. Leslee Cochrane.
Last September, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California granted a preliminary injunction against enforcing the law, and on Wednesday, ADF announced
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