NATIONAL BRIEFING / WASHINGTON STATE
Eleven people have used prescribed drugs to end their lives during the first six months after a state law took effect allowing assisted suicides for terminally ill patients, an advocacy group said.
Five other people received life-ending drugs under the law but died without using them, the group Compassion & Choices of Washington said.
The deaths amount to fewer than one-tenth of 1% of all deaths statewide in 2008, indicating the law is being used carefully and sparingly, Robb Miller, executive director of the group, said at a news conference.
Washington and Oregon are the only states with voter-approved assisted-suicide laws.
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