State killing of vulnerable people without request and not reported!

Media Release 4 August 2025

Right to Life earnestly requests our government to follow the example of the Netherlands and conduct studies every 5 years to reveal the extent of the state killing by euthanasia, without explicit consent, of the vulnerable in New Zealand.

Health NZ promotes the fiction that the End of Life Choice Act 2019 [EOLC], is health care and provides death with dignity.

Right to Life believes that there is no dignity in being murdered by a doctor with a lethal injection, or being assisted in suicide. Euthanasia is intrinsically evil, it violates the Fifth Commandment of God, Thou shalt not kill and gives grave offence to God our Creator to whom our lives belong.

Since the introduction of the EOLC Act on 7th November 2021 to the 31st May 2025, the state has authorised and funded the killing of 959 vulnerable patients.

Right to Life believes that in the light of a recent Dutch study, there were probably a further 50 patients in New Zealand during that period, who were euthanised without their consent and knowledge.

The Netherlands has had a problem with under-reporting of doctors killing their patients, since the introduction of euthanasia there with the “Termination of Life on Request and Assisted Suicide (Review Procedures) Act" in 2002.

Every five years the Dutch government conducts a survey of all medical doctors in the Netherlands. The survey is to determine the number of deaths from all causes, including euthanasia, assisted suicide and ending of life without explicit request. The questionnaire allows a physician to respond anonymously. The data effectively uncovers the actual number of assisted deaths in a given year.

The latest, recently released study for 2021 discloses that there were 9,799 deaths representing 9,038 euthanasia deaths , 245 assisted suicides and 517 cases involving the ending of life without explicit consent. The 2015 study revealed 431 deaths without consent.

The study also revealed that there were 9,799 euthanasia deaths in the Netherlands, but the government stated that only 7,666 euthanasia deaths had been reported. This meant that 2,133 deaths were not reported, ie 22 % of all assisted deaths.

It is likely that in other nations which allow state killing of the vulnerable, such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand, there are many killed without their explicit consent, or which are not reported, but they don’t conduct studies to reveal the real truth.

Right to Life believes that our N.Z. government recognises that it is cheaper to kill vulnerable patients than to care for them, it has no desire to investigate this appalling injustice as it wants to uphold the myth that euthanasia is health care and that there is no abuse of the law in New Zealand.

Right to Life is committed to the repeal of the euthanasia legislation and the government fully funding of hospice palliative care in New Zealand.

Ken Orr,

Spokesperson,

Right to Life New Zealand Inc.