Death with Dignity

Video: “The Cheryl Hauser Effect” Film Preview and Panel, 4/18/26

April 28, 2026 / Death with Dignity, Education, VSED

On Saturday, April 18, at Bellingham Unitarian Fellowship, Wendy Longacre Brown and Sarah Longacre held a panel discussion in Bellingham, WA, home to VSED Resources Northwest. Longtime VRNW board member Kate Christie, author of The VSED Handbook, participated in the panel, as did Phyllis Shacter, author of Choosing to Die, and Erin Mae Glass, attorney […]

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Opinion Piece on VSED from the Tribune News Service

February 28, 2026 / Death with Dignity, End of life planning, In the news, VSED

Jim Nowlan, a retired professor of American politics who lives in Illinois, wrote an opinion piece about the right to stop eating and drinking that was picked up by Trib Total Media in Western Pennsylvania (among other publications) titled, “Our Way of Dying is Evolving.” Here is an excerpt: I had my state rep contact

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Using VSED and Medical Aid in Dying (MAiD) to Avoid Late-Stage Dementia

January 15, 2025 / Death with Dignity, Medical aid-in-dying, VSED

In late 2024, attorney, medical ethics expert, and VSED advocate Professor Thaddeus Pope gave a virtual talk to the Hemlock Society of San Diego about how dementia patients might be able to utilize medical-aid-in-dying to avoid late stages of their disease. As Professor Pope explains, if the patient were to begin VSED while they still

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Quebec to approve advance requests for MAID as of Oct. 30, 2024

September 15, 2024 / Death with Dignity, In the news, Medical aid-in-dying, VSED

Canada’s medical assistance in dying law continues to evolve. A February 2015 Canadian Supreme Court ruling, Carter v. Canada, paved the way for the legalization of physician-assisted suicide. The following year, Parliament passed federal legislation to allow Canadian residents to request MAiD under very specific circumstances and rules; generally, visitors to Canada are not eligible. Eligibility requirements

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Wendy Mitchell: The Case for Assisted Dying in the UK

May 15, 2024 / Book corner, Death with Dignity, Medical aid-in-dying

British co-authors Anna Wharton and Wendy Mitchell penned three bestselling books before Wendy, diagnosed in 2014 with early-onset Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia, chose VSED to escape the final stages of her disease. Shortly after Wendy’s death in February 2024, Anna wrote a post for her blog, White Ink, about medical aid in dying in the

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In the News: VRNW members interviewed by the Salish Current

March 1, 2023 / Death with Dignity, In the news, Medical aid-in-dying

In mid-February, VRNW co-founders Nancy Simmers and Andrea Fenwick were interviewed for an article that appeared in the Salish Current, a nonprofit, online local news organization serving Whatcom, San Juan, and Skagit counties. Journalist Kai Uyehara also interviewed Cassa Sutherland, End of Life Washington‘s client services manager, and Lashanna Williams, executive director of Seattle-based A Sacred

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VRNW Member Responds to Seattle Times Article about WA’s Death with Dignity/MAID Law

February 9, 2023 / Death with Dignity, Medical aid-in-dying, Personal story, VSED

Recently, retired newspaper photographer Peter Haley penned an editorial in the Seattle Times: “State’s ‘Death with Dignity’ law failed my wife.” In his piece, Haley wrote that Toni, his “beloved wife of 27 years,” was forced to die alone because Washington state’s medical aid-in-dying (MAID) law doesn’t cover ALS. Toni chose to die on her

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More Training Needed for Washington’s Engrossed Substitute House Bill 1608

January 11, 2023 / Death with Dignity, End of life planning, Medical providers

In Whatcom County, which VSED Resources Northwest calls home, the only hospital is run by a faith-based healthcare system that chooses not to medically support Washington State’s Death with Dignity law. In the past, both patients and medical providers have been confused about what the hospital’s responsibility is to offer accurate information and referral information

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