Jerry Brown Denies Life Option After Approving Death Drugs

California Governor Jerry Brown approved legislation providing death-inducing drugs the week before vetoing legislation that would have allowed terminally ill Californians to seek certain life-saving drugs.

Brown denied Assembly Bill 159 on Sunday after it passed through the Democrat-heavy California legislature. Under the “Right to Try” bill, a patient with a terminal diagnosis would be allowed to seek out experimental drugs and treatments not yet approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration, according to the Contra Costa Times.

The bill was a bipartisan effort, introduced by Democrat Assemblyman Ian Calderon of Whittier and principally co-sponsored by Republican Senator Jeff Stone of Temecula.

Adopted thus far in 24 states, the measure is the design of the Arizona-based Goldwater institute. The Times report recorded the institute’s National Policy advisor Kurt Altman from Sunday, saying that Governor Brown “has deprived Californians of the right to try to save their lives when their mortality hangs in the balance. We hope that the Legislature will work together in a bipartisan effort to override Governor Brown’s veto.”

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin warned the public years ago of Obamacare “death panels.” Since then Americans have seen continual moves to enable end-of-life measures over potentially life saving measures. Breitbart News reported just over a year ago on moves by the federal government to push the end-of-life option that failed to survive final passage of Obamacare.

Assembly Floor Analysis for AB 159, the “right to try” legislation, details that existing state law, “prohibits, under the Sherman Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Law, the sale, delivery, or giving away of a drug or device unless it has been approved to market by either the FDA or the California Department of Public Health.”

Summary of the legislature passed and Brown vetoed bill reads, “Authorizes the manufacturer of an investigational drug to make an investigational drug that is not yet approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) available to a patient, under certain circumstances.” Those circumstances include, in part, a person facing a life-threatening disease or condition who has “considered all other treatment options currently approved by the FDA,” as detailed in Senate Floor Analysis.

The bill most recently passed the Senate with no opposition, 40-0, and the Assembly 76-2 with two legislators choosing not to vote.

Upon vetoing the bill, Brown was reported as saying “Patients with life threatening conditions should be able to try experimental drugs,” but that he opposed the bill in favor of a recently implemented federal “compassionate use” program.

On the event of the Governor’s passage of the physician assisted suicide bill, Californians against assisted suicide stated, “As someone of wealth and access to the world’s best medical care and doctors, the Governor’s background is very different than that of millions of Californians living in healthcare poverty without that same access…”