Fresh polling has revealed widespread concern about plans to legalise assisted suicide ahead of a debate in Parliament this Friday on changing the law.
Asked about the statement, "Before parliament considers introducing assisted dying, there should be a Royal Commission to examine the future of palliative and end of life care," seven in 10 agreed.
The survey of over 5,000 British adults also noted scepticism about promised protections, with a majority (59 per cent) saying that it was "impossible to create safeguards that would always prevent people from being coerced into assisted dying". Only a quarter (24 per cent) disagreed.
Labour MP Kim Leadbeater's Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill would require two doctors and a High Court judge to sign off on applications for assisted suicide. Applicants would have to be terminally ill and have the mental capacity to make the decision.
The survey carried out by Focaldata on behalf of the Care Not Killing coalition found that three quarters of respondents (73 per cent) supported a change to the law. However, after they were presented with 10 arguments against assisted suicide, the proportion who did not change their mind to oppose assisted suicide or answer 'don't know' fell to only 11 per cent.
It also revealed confusion about what the term 'assisted dying' means, with one in six (17 per cent) wrongly thinking it included hospice care and around half (52 per cent) thinking it involved "life-prolonging treatment".
There was also concern about people being put at risk with over half (58 per cent) saying it was "inevitable that some of the most vulnerable people in society, such as the elderly, people with disabilities or mental health conditions would feel pressured into an assisted death".
Over half (56 per cent) felt that if assisted suicide were legalised, the current state of the NHS would likely push some people into assisted suicide, while a similar proportion (57 per cent) agreed that its lower cost compared to palliative care would put pressure on the NHS to offer it.
Dr Gordon Macdonald, CEO of Care Not Killing, said the findings showed that the British public "want parliamentarians to fix the NHS, properly funding palliative and social care, not introduce a dangerous and ideological policy that would pressure the vulnerable, the elderly and disabled people into ending their lives prematurely".
"This major new poll blows apart the arguments so often advanced by advocates of state-assisted killing that the public backs changing the law. But this support is based on a superficial question that relies on the public's understandable lack of knowledge about what happens in the small number of countries that have legalised assisted suicide or euthanasia," he said.
"When members of the public hear that some countries have extended laws on assisted dying to include children under 12; that some people have felt pressure to opt for assisted suicide or euthanasia because they feel they are a burden on loved ones and how in the UK a clear majority of palliative care doctors oppose changing the law, support drastically deteriorates."
He added, "The message could not be clearer, we need care, not killing."
