SYDNEY - An estimated 37,000 euthanasia deaths occur each year in Australia as a result of doctors intentionally accelerating a patient's death, according to a confidential new survey of 3,000 Australian doctors.
The survey, published in the Medical Journal of Australia, defined euthanasia as any death "intentionally accelerated by a doctor", which it said went beyond the contemporary narrow definition of euthanasia as a death caused by a drug administered at the patient's request. Euthanasia is illegal in Australia except in the Northern Territory.
