Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed Senate Bill 1950 into law on Friday, December 12, making Illinois the latest U.S. state to legalize physician-assisted suicide. It is the 12th state, along with the District of Columbia, to legalize it.
SB 1950, which was initially introduced as a food safety bill, was passed into law in the early morning hours of October 31. Under the bill, those with a qualifying medical condition will be able to receive "medical aid in dying medication" after several requests. The bill goes into effect on September 12, 2026.
"I have been deeply impacted by the stories of Illinoisans or their loved ones that have suffered from a devastating terminal illness, and I have been moved by their dedication to standing up for freedom and choice at the end of life in the midst of personal heartbreak," said Pritzker in a news release following the signing.
Concerns raised about coercion and suicide rates
Opponents to assisted suicide disagreed with Pritzker's claim that the law will be "thoughtfully implemented," and say that there are real risks to this kind of legislation.
The Catholic Conference of Illinois, the public policy arm of the state's Catholic bishops, warned that the legalization of assisted suicide put the state on a "dangerous and heartbreaking path" that makes suicide a "valid solution for life's challenges."
"Rather than investing in real end-of-life support such as palliative and hospice care, pain management, and family-centered accompaniment, our state has chosen to normalize killing oneself," said the conference in a statement issued after Pritzker's signing.
Further, "This law ignores the very real failures in access to quality care that drive vulnerable people to despair. It does nothing to ensure patients are offered services, protected from coercion, or surrounded by loved ones when they kill themselves," said the bishops.
By signing the law, the state of Illinois is effectively "endorsing the death option while claiming compassion," and could put vulnerable groups at increased risk of suicide.
When suicide is a "medical option" in a state, studies have indicated that all forms of suicide have risen, said the conference.
"We may fund suicide prevention hotlines, expand suicide prevention programs, and train communities, but those efforts are hollow when we are simultaneously signaling that some lives are too burdensome or too expensive to save," said the bishops. "Can we depend on distressed youth and others to understand the difference between their pain and that of the dying?"
True compassion, said the statement, "means helping people live, not helping them die."
Unanswered questions regarding religious liberty
The Thomas More Society, a Catholic law firm that previously threatened a lawsuit against Illinois should assisted suicide become law, called the signing "a graphic and dangerous turning point for the moral and constitutional landscape" of the state.
“This is a dark and sorrowful day for Illinois. When the state signals that some lives are no longer worth living, the most vulnerable pay the price,” said Thomas Olp, executive vice president at Thomas More Society, said in a statement provided to Aleteia.
“Instead of offering true compassion, support, and care, this law offers a fatal prescription. That is not mercy. It is abandonment," he said.
With the legalization of assisted suicide through SB 1950, the state is "erod(ing) the foundational conscience rights for medical professionals and religious medical practices," said Olp.
Under the law, medical professionals who are opposed to physician-assisted suicide will still have to refer patients who request the medication to a provider who will.
“The State is forcing doctors to become active participants and cooperators in a patient’s suicide -- no matter if their faith, ethics, or Hippocratic Oath forbid it,” Olp explained.
“This is unconscionable coercion, plain and simple. No doctor should be ordered by the government to participate directly or indirectly in a process that deliberately ends a human life.”
Catholic and other religious hospitals will also have to participate in assisted suicide under SB 1950, and will have to keep staff who will agree to prescribe lethal medication to sick patients. The drugs, however, can be provided to the patient off the grounds of the hospital or medical facility.
This, said Olp, "is a Trojan horse designed to violate and undermine the missions of religious healthcare institutions. Gov. Pritzker’s assisted suicide law threatens the integrity of Catholic and Christian medical institutions statewide.”
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