Colorado Voters Approve Medically Assisted Suicide Measure

DENVER (CBS4) - Colorado voters have approved a ballot measure that allows terminally ill patients to take life-ending drugs.

Proposition 106 has passed, which means Colorado joins Oregon, Washington, Vermont and California as states with medically-assisted-suicide laws.

It passed by a margin of 65 percent to 35 percent.

Millions were raised by both supporters and opponents of the ballot initiative.

The law will require that a mentally competent patient have a six-month prognosis and get two doctors to sign off on three requests for life-ending medication. It requires doctors to discuss alternatives with the patient. It calls for safe storage, tracking and disposal of lethal drugs, recognizing that a patient can change his or her mind.

It also requires the patient to take the drugs himself or herself and have doctors report annually to the state about each case in which life-ending drugs are prescribed.

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