FALLS CHURCH, Va. — Barbara Green is celebrating a milestone. Life.
In July of 2022, she was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. Doctors told her she'd have eight to 11 months to live.
Nineteen months later, she is still alive.
"It's a whole year later and here I am," she told WUSA9 with a smile on her face.
Green first sat down with WUSA9 in January of 2023, Senate Bill 930 had just passed by indefinitely, meaning it would not move forward. The legislation would have allowed medically assisted death in Virginia.
"I don't want to go through that horrible period where you know you're going to die and all you can do is lay there and wait. Everything else in the medical system you sign your life away when you agree to do it, and I'm making those decisions. I want to make this decision," said Green.
But now, a new bill would legalize medically assisted deaths for patients experiencing terminal illnesses has advanced in the Virginia Senate.
According to the text, Senate Bill 280 “allows an adult diagnosed with a terminal condition to request an attending health care provider to prescribe a self-administered controlled substance for the purpose of ending the patient's life in a humane and dignified manner.”
Green never thought she'd get to see the legislation reintroduced. But now, she's hoping she'll get to see it through.
However, there are some who do not think this is the way to handle end of life care.
Doctors have previously testified that the legislation is unethical. Dr. John Paul Verderese, an internal medicine physician in Northern Virginia, worries about what kind of precedence this would set.
“I think there's a hazard to passing this bill,” Verderese said. “I think the problem when you introduce physicians and other health care providers into this act, I think it creates a conflict. This will become a treatment that can be abused.”
Medically assisted deaths are already legal in 10 states and Washington, D.C.
There are certain protocols in place:
- A patient must request orally on two occasions and in writing, signed by the patient and one witness, and that the patient be given an express opportunity to rescind his request at any time.
- The bill makes it a Class 2 felony to willfully and deliberately alter, forge, conceal, or destroy a patient's request, or rescission of request, for a self-administered controlled substance to end his life with the intent and effect of causing the patient's death; (ii) to coerce, intimidate, or exert undue influence on a patient to request a self-administered controlled substance for the purpose of ending his life or to destroy the patient's rescission of such request with the intent and effect of causing the patient's death; or (iii) to coerce, intimidate, or exert undue influence on a patient to forgo a self-administered controlled substance for the purpose of ending the patient's life.
- The bill also grants immunity from civil or criminal liability and professional disciplinary action to any person who complies with the provisions of the bill.
- Allows health care providers to refuse to participate in the provision of a self-administered controlled substance to a patient for the purpose of ending the patient's life.
"I believe that people should have the dignity to make these decisions for themselves," said Democratic Senator Jennifer Boysko, who represents Senate District 38.
She's a copatron on SB 280.
"This is a purely optional policy. No doctor would be forced to implement it. No individual would be forced to implement it. There are a lot of safeguards," she told WUSA9.
As for Green, she's looking forward to her 80th birthday in April. It's a birthday she never thought she'd get to see. She's using her numbered days to advocate for SB 280.
"The sense of purpose seems to be keeping me alive," she said.
She shared this advice, that we could all use.
"You have to enjoy every day. Especially because you don't know if you're going to wake up tomorrow. Enjoy today," said Green.