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Whatever the law, informal doctor-assisted suicide will occur, as it has for years. "[Doctors] give a bunch of drugs in combination with a coded message: Go home and do what you want," says Dr. Lauren Shaiova, an end-of-life expert at Manhattan's Beth Israel hospital. She says that is sometimes the only solution for dying people crushed by fatigue and darkness. Says Shaiova: "What are you going to do, just give them Prozac? That can fail for people who have everything to live for." Can bureaucrats really settle such issues? The Dutch will point the way.
--With reporting by Abi Daruvalla/Amsterdam