Last week, Professor Rob George (President of the Association for Palliative Medicine) sent a misleading email to members about the assisted dying debate.

In his email to members, Professor George claims:

"Assisted Dying seems to be trying to muscle in on the BMA Representative Meeting this May/June in Belfast as the BMA's report on end of life care is being discussed."

The report Professor George is talking about and being debated by the BMA is called "End-of-life care and physician assisted dying".

How on earth can assisted dying “muscle in” to a debate about… assisted dying?

Why is he hiding this from APM members?

In his email he also claims:

"Nothing has changed in the arguments and the debates in Parliament were comprehensive and definitive on the UK mainland, however we will be refreshing our briefing materials for you in anticipation..."

Is he serious?

Let's just review what has changed in the last 9 months alone...

• California has legalised assisted dying, meaning another 38 million Americans will have a choice denied to Britons
• Canada will shortly be legalising some form of right-to-die legislation
• Britons continue to travel abroad to die since the Assisted Dying Bill was debated, with countless more suffering at home
• Millions of Britons showed their support for assisted dying following the incredibly moving Simon's Choice documentary on BBC2

Even the British Medical Association (who themselves oppose assisted dying) have made efforts to at least acknowledge that the issue of assisted dying has moved on considerably in the past year.

Why is he doing this?

Time and time again we have seen Professor George try and stifle the assisted dying debate. But what he continues to ignore is the voice of patients. If anything is trying to "muscle in" to the debate it is the voices of the 82% of people who support assisted dying. It is unacceptable for Professor George to ignore them and mislead palliative care professionals in this way.

If you're as outraged by this as we are, sign our petition demanding Professor George tell his members the truth.