{"id":40536,"date":"2026-06-17T07:14:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T12:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thexradio.com\/news\/?p=40536"},"modified":"2026-06-17T08:26:40","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T13:26:40","slug":"advocates-patients-file-lawsuit-to-block-medical-aid-in-dying-law-in-illinois","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thexradio.com\/news\/local-news\/40536-advocates-patients-file-lawsuit-to-block-medical-aid-in-dying-law-in-illinois\/","title":{"rendered":"Advocates, Patients File Lawsuit to Block &#8216;Medical Aid in Dying&#8217; Law in Illinois"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"pdfprnt-buttons pdfprnt-buttons-post pdfprnt-top-right\"><a href=\"javascript: window.print()\" class=\"pdfprnt-button pdfprnt-button-print\" target=\"_self\" ><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thexradio.com\/news\/wp-content\/plugins\/pdf-print\/images\/print.png\" alt=\"image_print\" title=\"Print Content\" \/><span class=\"pdfprnt-button-title pdfprnt-button-print-title\">Print<\/span><\/a><\/div><p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The lawsuit seeks to strike down the September-effective law for discrimination<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><b>Article Summary<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Disability advocates and patients filed federal lawsuits last week in Illinois and other states seeking to block laws allowing medical aid in dying.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The complaint argues the practice, sometimes referred to as physician-assisted suicide, is discriminatory and violates due process through a lack of safeguards and oversight.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Illinois\u2019 law, which will go into effect Sept. 12, faced scrutiny from these groups before it was passed in October 2025.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This summary was written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">By JENNA SCHWEIKERT<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Capitol News Illinois<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><a href=\"mailto:jschweikert@capitolnewsillinois.com\u00a0\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">jschweikert@capitolnewsillinois.com\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A federal lawsuit filed last week seeks to block an Illinois law allowing doctors to help terminally ill patients end their own lives ahead of its Sept. 12 effective date.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The complaint, brought by medical advocacy groups, an Illinois-based physician and two disabled Illinoisans, claims the law discriminates against people with disabilities and lacks significant safeguards or oversight, violating due process and equal protection.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The End-of-Life Options for Terminally Ill Patients Act, or EOLA, will allow doctors to prescribe lethal medication to a terminal patient if they meet certain qualifications and make two oral requests at least five days apart. The law was passed in October 2025 and signed by the governor in December.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One of the plaintiffs is Ebony Payne, a Chicagoan who is quadriplegic. Payne was one of the opponents to the bill prior to its passage and has continued to advocate against it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cFor people with disabilities overall, I don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s a safe bet, because just like me, anybody could have an infection and fall prey to doctors who are not as scrupulous as others,\u201d Payne said, referring to an infection she had that led her to tell her doctor she \u201cdidn\u2019t want to live anymore.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In that instance, her mother obtained power of attorney and could make medical decisions for Payne when she was unable to. Under the law, doctors are not required to notify family of the patient\u2019s decision and there is no appeals process. But patients must be of sound mind and have a prognosis of less than six months to make an eligible request. Nobody else, even with power of attorney, would be able to make the decision for them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cMany, many people who can&#8217;t or don\u2019t have these opportunities to speak up for themselves \u2026 hopefully I do a well enough job to help their voice be heard, especially in situations like this,\u201d Payne said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oral requests for aid in dying must be accompanied by a written report signed by two witnesses, at least one of which is not an employee of the health facility or a relative or estate beneficiary of the patient. But if a doctor believes the patient has less than five days to live, they can approve an emergency prescription.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A lawsuit was also filed in New York, joining three previous cases in California, Colorado and Delaware. Currently, 13 states and the District of Columbia have laws permitting aid in dying. Illinois is the first Midwestern state to legalize the practice.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Illinois\u2019 law is similar to other states, with the basics being copied from Oregon, the first state to legalize the practice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Discrimination claims<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The lawsuit is centered around the claim that EOLA discriminates against people with disabilities by singling out disabled people for aid in dying and not providing them with sufficient protections against abuse of the practice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe perception that Ebony is suffering every day, that she is better off dead, is discrimination,\u201d attorney Michael Bien said. \u201cThe idea that we can categorize people and say certain people should be eligible for suicide and other people are not is discrimination.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Doctors must weigh coercion and mental status before they prescribe the medication. And the law says no person is considered a qualified patient solely because of age, disability or mental health condition. But with federal healthcare cuts putting more people under pressure, Bien questioned if this is an environment in which the law should go into effect.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">During debates last spring, advocates from other states, including Oregon, said there has been <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/capitolnewsillinois.com\/news\/pritzker-signs-medical-aid-in-dying-bill-amid-religious-opposition\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">no evidence of discriminatory use<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of the procedure.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cEach law authorizing medical aid in dying states clearly and unequivocally that disability alone does not automatically qualify or disqualify someone for access to this healthcare option,\u201d Veronica Darling,\u00a0director of litigation with healthcare advocacy group Compassion &amp; Choices, said in a statement. \u201cThese laws are not about discrimination, they are about compassion, dignity, and respecting the healthcare choices of terminally ill adults when it matters most.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Oversight and safeguards<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In addition to singling out people with disabilities, the lawsuit claims that they are at extra risk because of \u201ctoothless\u201d guidelines and lack of independent oversight, taking \u201cthe power of death from the sovereign state and (giving) it to private actors.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After a request and before writing a prescription, the physician must evaluate the patient\u2019s diagnosis, mental capacity and potential coercion and refer to a consulting physician for approval. A full mental health examination is only required if the attending doctor believes the patient isn\u2019t stable.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Once written, the prescription can be filled and taken at any time the patient chooses.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhat if you become mentally unstable? \u2026 There&#8217;s nothing at all involved with the actual moment,\u201d Bien said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The doctor must provide the patient with sufficient information regarding \u201call appropriate end-of-life care options,\u201d and the risks and benefits of each, so the patient can make a \u201cvoluntary and affirmative decision\u201d regarding their end-of-life care.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The lawsuit also claims the law overrides the interests of doctors to govern the ethical practices of their own profession, though EOLA does give physicians the right to choose whether to participate in aid-in-dying without consequence. Doctors are also exempt from civil or criminal liability and professional consequences for prescribing medication or not doing so.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/capitolnewsillinois.com\/\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Capitol News Illinois<\/span><\/i><\/a><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The lawsuit seeks to strike down the September-effective law for discrimination Article Summary Disability advocates and patients filed federal lawsuits last week in Illinois and other states seeking to block [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":40543,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Advocates, Patients File Lawsuit to Block &#039;Medical Aid in Dying&#039; Law in Illinois - Effingham&#039;s News and Sports Leader, 979XFM and KJ Country 102.3<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Effingham&#039;s News and Sports Leader\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thexradio.com\/news\/local-news\/40536-advocates-patients-file-lawsuit-to-block-medical-aid-in-dying-law-in-illinois\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Advocates, Patients File Lawsuit to Block &#039;Medical Aid in Dying&#039; 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