‘Death with dignity’ bill dies in Nevada Legislature

Nevada Sen. David Parks, D-Las Vegas, works on the Senate floor at the Legislative Building in Carson City, Nev., on Thursday, April 9, 2015. Parks confirmed Thursday his bill that would allow terminally ill patients to end their life will not be heard this session. (Cathleen Allison/Las Vegas Review Journal)

CARSON CITY — A bill that would allow terminally ill patients to end their life will not be heard in the Nevada Legislature and will die without a hearing, a committee chairman and a sponsor of the bill said Thursday.

State Sen. David Parks, D-Las Vegas, was the primary sponsor of Senate Bill 336, the so-called “death with dignity” bill that had five Democratic and two Republican co-sponsors.

“We’ll try again next time,” Parks said, referring to the next legislative session in 2017.

State Sen. Joe Hardy, R-Boulder City and chairman of the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services, confirmed he will not schedule the bill for a hearing.

“The death with dignity bill will die,” said Hardy, who is a physician.

Hardy said that as a medical doctor he supports hospice care and helping terminally ill patients manage pain. But he does not support voluntarily ending life, as is allowed in Oregon, Washington, and most recently, Vermont.

The Nevada bill was modeled after the Oregon law, which has been in effect for two decades.

Parks’ proposal would have required that a patient be a state resident at least 18 years old, diagnosed with a terminal illness and capable of making health care decisions for himself or herself.

It would have required that a consulting physician confirm the diagnosis of terminal illness. Further, the patient would have to be able to administer the lethal dose of medication without assistance.

Parks earlier said he was motivated to seek the bill after talking with friends and colleagues who told of their own friends and family members who suffered through long, painful illness before death.

He also talked of a woman he worked with years ago who was severely disabled and later died of bladder cancer.

“Morphine only provided limited relief,” Parks said, adding that before she died the woman asked him to try to get a death with dignity law passed in Nevada.

Contact Sandra Chereb at schereb@reviewjournal.com or 775-687-3901. Find her on Twitter: @SandraChereb