Four Democratic state lawmakers are fronting an effort to legalize medically assisted suicide for Ohioans with terminal diagnoses, following an effort in 2018 that did not go anywhere.
The “Ohio Medical Aid in Dying (MAID)” Act, which does not yet have its bill number or committee assignment, would allow terminally ill residents with less than six months to live to request a prescription for lethal, aid-in-dying medication. Two doctors would have to okay the oral and written requests for the prescription to be filled, according to Ohio End of Life Options.
Rep. Eric Synenberg (D-Beachwood) is leading the legislative effort. Synenberg knows it will have opponents, he told reporters Thursday.
"My ask today is that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle consider having civil discourse on this bill,” Synenberg said.
He joined Ohio End of Life Options advocates at the Statehouse for a news conference. Among them was Michael Oser, a Columbus-based lawyer with a terminal form of cancer.
“I’m going to die,” Oser told reporters. “I want to make that determination of how I die and where I die. The question for me, like all other Ohioans, is, none of us get to get out of here alive—the question is not if, it’s how. This bill is really about the how.”
Still, Ohio’s GOP-majority legislature is unlikely to consider it. Faith-based organizations with strong influence in Columbus, including Ohio Right to Life and the Center for Christian Virtue (CCV), are opponents.
“Doctors should be in the business of healing, not killing. Ohio must remain a state that treasures every heartbeat,” CCV wrote Thursday on its website. “CCV is committed to blocking any legislative effort to allow Ohio to become a (MAID) state.”
Washington D.C. and 13 states that largely lean left have legalized medically assisted suicide. Six in ten Americans don't morally object to it, according to a 2026 analysis by Pew Research Center.
