Both supporters and opponents came to give harrowing testimony during Wednesday’s public hearing on a bill that would give terminally ill patients the legal right to obtain a prescription for a lethal dose of medication to end their lives.
“When you’re dying your choices are gone,” said Shimer, who also watched his mother die of lung cancer in 2015. “I think if you have the choice to say you want it or at least feel like you have it that gives you the dignity back.”
Jason Smith of Greenwich said his aunt took her own life when the pain of her illness became unbearable.
Jason Smith said his Aunt Rachel may not have taken her own life by suicide if Connecticut had a more compassionate, lawful way to aid sufferers.
“She suffered the most ungracious, undignified and horrible death imaginable,” said Smith who heads the Completed Life Initiative.