This article is reprinted from National Review with the permission of the author.

“Nor shall any man’s entreaty prevail upon me to administer poison to anyone; neither will I counsel any man to do so.” So says the Hippocratic Oath.

Alas, the oath is as dead as the patients some doctors now assist in suicide. In California, the Sutter Family Residency Medical Program even offers residencies to train doctors in assisted suicide — euphemistically called medical aid in dying (MAID).

Chillingly, most of the doctors who participated in a small study on assisted suicide and who prescribe poison as part of their job like it. The study was published in Academic Medicine, the journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges, which pushes the assisted-suicide-training agenda:

The authors surveyed 28 graduates and collected data from 21 former residents (response rate, 75%). Of these 21 former residents, 17 (81%) reported having opted to receive training in MAID during residency. Of the 12 residents who received training and were currently practicing in a location that allowed MAID, 7 (58%) were still practicing aid in dying, and of these 7 residents, 5 (71%) reported that their aid-in-dying work was more rewarding than their other clinical responsibilities.

More rewarding than healing patients, extending their lives, and palliating their pain? Good grief. This reminds me of that Canadian doctor “whose face lights up” when describing having killed more than 400 people, telling a reporter that providing lethal injections is “the most fulfilling work she has ever done.”

Participating residents get hands-on experience in poison-prescribing:

The case load for residents acting as the prescribing physician is monitored by the faculty to ensure a relatively even distribution. Aid-in-dying cases are precepted with any of the MAID-trained preceptors. If fulfilling the prescriber role, residents typically have 2 separate appointments with a given patient, whereas those acting as the consultant typically only have 1 appointment. Residents fulfilling the prescriber role are additionally expected to coordinate the patient’s care and set up the consultant visit, often with a fellow resident. They are also expected to facilitate discussions and coordinate the timing of prescription and ingestion with the patient, patient’s family, and hospice agencies. Residents are encouraged to attend the planned death of at least 1 of their MAID patients during residency, although this is not required.

Apparently medical students and newly graduated doctors want such training, with many also wanting to participate in assisted suicide:

This lack of MAID-trained clinicians is in clear contrast to the desire for such training among medical students and residents. In studies of Canadian trainees, between 41% and 71% reported being willing to provide MAID care. In a 2021 survey of U.S. internal medicine residents, Pham et al reported that 81% were interested in receiving MAID training, with 34% responding they would be likely to participate in MAID after graduating, and a 2001 survey of U.S. surgical residents found that 87% would be willing to assist in the death of a patient with terminal cancer.

Yikes.

Still, most doctors today do not participate where such practices are legal. None should. And the fewer who do, the less it will be normalized.

That seems precisely the circumstance that the push to increase assisted-suicide residency programs is designed to overcome:

Although demand for MAID training in residency is high, access to this training more broadly is limited. These preliminary data suggest that implementation of a MAID curriculum in residency training may be effective at producing MAID-practicing clinicians, but more research must be performed to assess the generalizability of this training model to other residency training programs. This assessment can only be accomplished through a broad dissemination of residency MAID curricula. . . .

Overall, we found preliminary evidence that suggests such training is highly desirable among residents and may be effective at producing MAID-practicing physicians after residency. This report also provides the basic structure of a residency MAID curriculum for implementation at other residency programs.

Great efforts are being made by activists and media to normalize assisted suicide as the most “dignified” means of dying. And now, we can see that this agenda has extended to include a push to increase the training of doctors in this practice, with the apparent support of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

This leads us to a pressing question: If doctors become assisted-suicide boosters — again, as has already happened in Canada, where MDs are now urged to suggest euthanasia — who will be left to protect vulnerable patients?