National Assembly to vote definitively on right to assisted dying

Paris – 15 July 2026: The National Assembly will decide this Wednesday, in its final reading, on the bill intended to create a right to assisted dying under strict conditions. After repeated failure to reach an agreement with the Senate, the lower house has the final say under Article 45 of the Constitution. Its adoption would bring the parliamentary process, underway since 2025, to its legislative conclusion.

The Senate rejected the text again on 7 July, after the two chambers had already differed sharply in several readings. The National Assembly approved the proposal in a new reading on 30 June. In the final deliberation, lawmakers may no longer amend the text. The vote will therefore essentially concern the version previously adopted by the National Assembly.

The law is intended to give adults with a serious and incurable illness access to a lethal substance. The condition is that the illness affects life expectancy and that the person suffers from treatment-resistant or intolerable suffering. The substance is generally to be taken by the person concerned; if this is physically impossible, it may be administered by a doctor or nurse under certain conditions.

The government presents the measure as a tightly regulated extension of self-determination at the end of life. Opponents, however, see a risk that vulnerable people will not be adequately protected and that the relationship between care, medicine and killing on request will shift fundamentally. In its deliberations, the Senate had favored a considerably more restrictive framework and ultimately rejected the introduction of such a right.

Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu announced that, following the expected adoption, he would refer the matter to the Constitutional Council. The judges are to examine in particular whether the length of the withdrawal period stipulated by law is compatible with personal freedom and human dignity. The same applies to rules for adults under legal protection or guardianship, whose free and informed consent must be safeguarded particularly carefully.

A further point of review concerns the conscience clause for medical staff. Doctors and nurses should be able to refuse to participate, but must immediately inform the applicant and refer them to other professionals willing to participate. At the same time, the question arises of how this individual freedom can be reconciled with institutions whose mission is to support seriously ill people at the end of life and which exclude assisted dying on an institutional basis.

The referral to the Constitutional Council is not a political repetition of the parliamentary debate, but a review of individual provisions against the standard of the Constitution. The law can be promulgated only after its decision. In parallel, Parliament had already adopted a separate law to strengthen palliative care, aimed at expanding comprehensive end-of-life support nationwide.