“I am suing the State of California to remove the legal barrier between my doctor and myself to help me achieve a peaceful and dignified death, at the time and place of my choosing," Christine White said in a statement. The 53-year-old has been battling cancer for several years, first non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and then leukemia, which is currently in remission.
It is illegal in California to aid or advise someone to commit suicide, but in the lawsuit, White is asking the state to be more specific and explain who exactly falls under that prohibition.
The lawsuit asks San Francisco Superior Court to "clarify" that the law doesn’t apply to doctors and other health professionals assisting a dying, mentally competent patient.
“If and when the leukemia returns, I want to have the option to ask my doctor to aid me in my dying,” White said. “I don't want to die in a hospital, I've seen too many of my friends in the cancer patients' community die that way.”
The lawsuit comes several months after another California woman, Brittany Maynard, moved from San Francisco to Oregon, where the Death with Dignity Act allows physician-assisted suicides of terminally ill patients. Maynard was suffering from an inoperable brain tumor and in November took her own life.
Two California state senators last month introduced legislation similar to Oregon’s law, but that bill has not moved forward.
“I do not want to have to leave my husband, my family and my friends and move to Oregon, where terminal patients have some measure of peace of mind, dignity and control over their dying," White said in her statement filed with the lawsuit.
