Too complex, too late: the guardrails acting as roadblocks to voluntary assisted dying across Australia

Dr Andrea Bendrups, whose patient went through agony but died before he could access voluntary assisted dying. Photograph: Ellen Smith/The Guardian

By the time her patient’s suffering had become so great he asked Dr Andrea Bendrups for a substance to end his life, it was too late.

The man had terminal bowel cancer and was in and out of hospital for months, in agony for days at a time. But Bendrups and the other doctors treating him in Victoria were legally bound by a “gag clause” that stopped them bringing up the option of accessing voluntary assisted dying.