The date circled in red on the calendar is December 13th. It is the day when the text on the End of Life will arrive in the Chamber of Deputies, after a long and detailed work, which lasted months, to find an agreement in the Justice and Social Affairs committees of the Chamber. Who in the end vote the mandate to the speakers, Alfredo Bazoli (Pd) and Nicola Provenza (M5S), crossing a milestone awaited for months. It is the result of a compromise between the various forces that make up the majority, without neglecting the suggestions made by the opposition. Even if in the end the center-right remains compact and without distinction between who is in the majority and who, instead, is in the opposition: because Lega, Forza Italia and Fratelli d’Italia keep the line and vote against. The go-ahead for the text, therefore, bears the signature of Pd, M5S, Iv, Leu and + Europa.
“Now the responsibility passes to the Chamber of Deputies, all groups and individual members have the duty to respond to the sick and their families, to the needs of making our legal system more human by recognizing voluntary medically assisted death. Despite some ungenerous criticisms of the great work, of necessary mediation, we are satisfied because it is a good text »comment the presidents of the Justice and Social Affairs commissions, Mario Perantoni and Marialucia Lorefice. Among the measures that will now be examined by the Montecitorio hemicycle concern article 5, because “voluntary medically assisted death must take place in respect of the dignity of the sick person and in such a way as not to cause further suffering and avoid abuse”, while ” the doctor who received the request from the patient draws up a detailed and documented report on the clinical, psychological, social and family conditions of the applicant and the reasons that determined it and forwards it to the clinical evaluation committee “. Therefore “death as a result of medically assisted voluntary death is equivalent to death from natural causes in all respects”. Article 6, on the other hand, provides for the establishment of the Clinical Evaluation Committees at the local health authorities, which must be “multidisciplinary, autonomous and independent, made up of specialist doctors including palliative activists, and professionals with clinical and psychological skills , legal, social and bioethical “.
There is also a turning point with regard to criminal responsibilities, because Article 7 provides, in addition to not providing for sanctions for doctors and health and administrative personnel “who have initiated the procedure of medically assisted voluntary death, as well as to all those that have facilitated in any way to activate the structures to complete the procedure “. But above all “anyone who has been convicted, even with a final judgment, for having facilitated in any way the voluntary medically assisted death of a person before the entry into force of this law is not punishable, if at the time of the fact the conditions exist and the conditions “and” the free, informed and aware will “of the patient. Now it will be the chamber of the Chamber to express itself, where the blocks seem to have already been defined. But the game is certainly not over yet. Also because there is no lack of criticism: “Parliament has chosen to evade the questions posed by the referendum” on legal euthanasia “and to limit itself to translating into law (for the worse) the sentence of the Constitutional Court on the Cappato / Antoniani trial, a sentence that already the value of the law ”, complain from the Coscioni association. While the deputy and president of + Europe, Riccardo Magi, sees ominous omens on the horizon: «After years of paralysis, the committees hastily vote on a bill on assisted suicide that is seriously inadequate. Purpose: to bring whatever text it may be to the classroom, postponing the choices on the unsolved knots. Predictable outcome: the same as the Zan bill. The knots not untied now will not be untied later ».