Veneto’s fast-track approach to end-of-life care

The Veneto Regional Council, with 32 votes in favour, 5 abstentions and 14 against, has passed a law that “sets out procedures and timeframes for regional healthcare provision in relation to medically assisted suicide”. The President of the Veneto Regional Council, Luca Zaia, describes it as a ‘civilised’ law, going so far as to claim that the legislation would benefit not only patients but also doctors and healthcare professionals, who would no longer be ‘left to their own devices’ when faced with the most desperate cases. But, once again, the situation is far more complex than it is made out to be. From a legal perspective, Constitutional Court ruling No. 204 of 29 December 2025 – handed down in response to the Government’s appeal against the Tuscany Region’s Law No. 16 of 2025 – sets out precise constitutional boundaries and restricts the scope for regional legislation, in particular by calling into question the regions’ ability to require the National Health Service to be involved in assisted dying. It is worth recalling that the Constitutional Court, in well-known previous rulings often cited by the regions, has never stated that an area of non-punishability gives rise to a right to the provision of a public service for medically assisted suicide. From a medical and human perspective, the Veneto Region’s decision is even more perplexing. Faced with a healthcare system increasingly struggling to care for the chronically ill – not just those brutally labelled ‘terminally ill’ – due to structural shortcomings, staff shortages and a lack of training, are we really to believe that the promotion of death on demand is intended to ‘protect the sick’ and safeguard their right to choose? During the debates in the Veneto Regional Council chamber, did any member present data on the financial savings derived from promoting ‘a good death’ compared to the costs of days, weeks or months of hospitalisation for those who are cared for until the very end? Furthermore, someone claimed that the Regional Council had been able to ‘assume its responsibilities’ – a term which conceals the root meaning of ‘to answer for’. Those who work with patients, their families and friends of the seriously ill know full well that the answers expected – far more profound and respectful – are entirely different: those that a policy of ‘quick fixes’ would struggle far more to provide, those demanded every day by the patients and families we care for at home or in care homes.