Legal Status
The Dutch euthanasia laws require people to ask for euthanasia themselves (voluntary euthanasia), and it is legal for people of 12 years and older. The Groningen Protocol does not give physicians unassailable legal protection. Case law has so far protected physicians from prosecution as long as they act in accordance with the protocol, but no black-letter law exists in this area.
Read more about this topic: Groningen Protocol
Famous quotes related to legal status:
“In the course of the actual attainment of selfish ends—an attainment conditioned in this way by universality—there is formed a system of complete interdependence, wherein the livelihood, happiness, and legal status of one man is interwoven with the livelihood, happiness, and rights of all. On this system, individual happiness, etc. depend, and only in this connected system are they actualized and secured.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)