Feds Consider Cracking Down On Oregon Doctors Dea, Justice Department Review Law Allowing Physician-Assisted Suicide

The Clinton administration is considering whether to take action against Oregon doctors who help terminally ill patients commit suicide under Oregon’s law reaffirmed by voters this week, The Oregonian reports.

Such action would not be unprecedented. Last year, the administration attempted to stop doctors from prescribing medicinal marijuana under a voter-approved initiative in California.

Oregon’s doctor-assisted suicide law is under review by both the U.S. Justice Department and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, the newspaper said in its editions today.

“This is on the front burner here, and that’s basically all I can say,” said Catherine Shaw, chief of congressional and public affairs for the DEA.

A spokesman confirmed that the Justice Department carefully is studying the assisted-suicide issue, but he emphasized that the agency hasn’t finalized its policy.

“It’s premature to draw any conclusions as to the ultimate outcome of the department’s review,” said spokesman Gregory King.

President Clinton repeatedly has voiced strong opposition to doctor-assisted suicide.

Although states license doctors, physicians must be registered by the DEA to prescribe controlled substances, including the barbiturates that probably would be used under Oregon’s assisted-suicide law.

Federal law gives Attorney General Janet Reno the power to revoke a doctor’s registration for prescribing a controlled substance for anything other than a “legitimate medical purpose.”

Shaw said DEA officials will weigh, on a case-by-case basis, whether assisted suicide constitutes such a legitimate purpose. But she also noted that federal law already speaks against assisted suicide by denying federal Medicare and Medicaid funding money for the procedure.

The American Medical Association does not consider assisted suicide a legitimate medical use of barbiturates, and the DEA normally defers to the AMA on such matters.

AMA President Dr. Thomas Reardon said he would welcome a DEA move to pull doctors’ drug-prescribing privileges for taking part in assisted suicide.

But the Oregon Medical Association disagreed. Spokesman James Kronenberg said his group would act to protect a doctor’s right legal right to participate.

“We may have opposed assisted suicide, but it’s the law,” Kronenberg said. “Physicians should not be penalized for doing something that is legal.”

Oregon voters approved the Death With Dignity Act in 1994, but it was blocked by a judge’s order. On Tuesday, voters overwhelmingly rejected an attempt to repeal the law, which allows mentally competent terminally ill adults to ask doctors for a lethal prescription.

Oregon’s law prevents the state Board of Medical Examiners from punishing a doctor for participating - or not participating - in assisted suicide, said Kathleen Haley, the board’s executive director.

She said she is not sure how it would be possible for the DEA to interfere with that legal protection. “Under the law, a lethal prescription is legal as long as the physician is in conformance with the statute,” Haley said.

Federal prosecutors could use a new statute banning the use of federal Medicare and Medicaid funds money for assisted suicide.