Commission backs legal rights on ‘living wills’

ADULTS should be legally entitled to refuse medical treatment, including life-sustaining treatment, according to the Law Reform Commission.

It believes the legislative change is necessary so people can specify the medical interventions they do not want in an advanced care directive, sometimes called “a living will” in the US.

The move, however, would not alter or affect the existing criminal law under which euthanasia or assisted suicide is prohibited.