The think thank The Other Half has warned that the legalisation of assisted suicide in the UK poses an “unacceptable risk that women are coerced into state death”. 

The non-partisan study, led by Fiona Mackenzie MBE, looked at 100 so-called “mercy killings” in the UK and found that, contrary to the claims of assisted suicide campaigners, they were “overwhelmingly violent domestic homicides of women, by men”. 

Advocates often point to the prevalence of “mercy killings” to justify the legalisation of assisted suicide. But The Other Half says that its study shows that women are disproportionately affected by assisted suicide laws, which amount to the state “delivering domestic homicide on behalf of abusers”.

Out of 100 “mercy killings” in the UK in the last 25 years, 78 per cent of the people killed were female, while 88 per cent of the perpetrators were male, the study says. Many deaths were found to be unnecessarily brutal and triggered by care demands. 
Some of the men who killed their partners also had a history of domestic violence. 

One man was “championed” by the pro-assisted suicide group Dignity in Dying in 2022 (founded as the Voluntary Euthanasia Society) after he was accused of assisting in his first wife’s death. The same man had been jailed in 2017 for committing grievous bodily harm with intent against his second wife. 

Ms Mackenzie of The Other Half said that such cases “should terrify us”. Her study has been shared with MPs ahead of a vote this Friday on Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide bill. 

SPUC comment 

A SPUC spokesperson said: “This devastating study explodes the pro-assisted suicide narrative about ‘choice’ and ‘compassion’. 
“The shameless exploitation of so-called ‘mercy killings’ by Dignity in Dying and other such groups has whitewashed the brutal truth about ‘assisted suicide’: that it is often coerced, and many of the abusers are men.

“MPs must protect all citizens, especially women and vulnerable groups whose lives are on the line. The Leadbeater Bill must be rejected for the sake of safety and justice.”

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