Vermont's largest hospital will put off implementing the state's new aid-in-dying law, at least for now.
Governor Peter Shumlin is scheduled to sign into law on Monday the bill allowing doctors to prescribe lethal medication to terminally ill patients who request it. And the new law is to take effect immediately.
But at Burlington's Fletcher Allen Health Care, spokesman Mike Noble says the hospital will rely on a provision of the law allowing health care facilities and professionals not to participate.
He says Fletcher Allen officials first want to talk the issues over with their medical staffs and ethics committee, and that will take at least a few weeks.
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