The Slovenian parliament has passed a landmark bill on assisted dying giving terminally ill patients the option to end their life in a dignified way for the first time.

The bill enables adults capable of making an informed decision on their own to opt for assisted dying if they have a condition that cannot improve and suffer unbearable pain or psychological stress, or both.

Patients will have to express their intention to their doctor twice before submitting a formal request that the doctor forwards to a special commission along with their own opinion.

The commission would appoint an independent doctor to assess the applicant's condition, and a psychiatrist to assess the applicant's ability to make a decision.

Patients would have to ingest or inject the legal substance themselves, and healthcare workers, from nurses and doctors to pharmacists, would have the option of refusing participation in assisted dying.

The bill was tabled by a group of MPs from the three coalition parties and passed in a partisan 50:34 vote on 18 July.

It will take effect two weeks after it is published in the Official Gazette, but it will take another six months before it can be applied in practice, a transitional period designed to provide enough time to sort out all the planned procedures.

Divisive issue

The legislation is the result of years of efforts by advocacy groups representing older persons which campaigned hard to get the legislation to parliament.

Conservative groups and the Catholic church countered with their own campaigns centred on the sanctity of life from birth to natural death, and the need to improve palliative care first.

Several organisations representing doctors have spoken out against assisted dying as well, their primary concern being that doctors may be coerced into helping people end their lives, something the authors of the bill say is impossible.

Their original bill, tabled by advocacy groups with the support of the coalition, was defeated in parliament in 2024, but the same year a referendum was called and voters backed assisted dying with a slim majority of 55%.

This led the coalition parties to resubmit the motion, though in much milder form by dropping the option of euthanising patients without their consent.

The parliamentary debate reflected the deep-seated ideological divisions.

Bojana Muršič of the Social Democrats (SD), a junior coalition party, described the bill as not an attack on life but a celebration of compassion, freedom and human dignity.

The Christian democratic party New Slovenia (NSi) argued that the bill promotes "a culture of death and not a culture of life." adding that the constitutional concept of inviolability of human life cannot be the subject of a bill.

Referendum challenge likely

A conservative action group led by an activist best known as a staunch opponent of abortion has already announced it will challenge the legislation in parliament.

Each patient has the right to treatment, pain relief, care, compassion and closeness. The law on assisted dying contradicts that and forces the patient to die by poisoning, said activist Aleš Primc, who heads the group called Against the Poisoning of Patients.

To call a referendum, the group must initially collect 2,500 signatures. If successful, they then have two months to collect 40,000 verified signatures, whose submission then automatically triggers a referendum.