RCP threatened with judicial review over assisted dying poll

The Royal College of Physicians has been threatened with legal action by the former chair of its ethics committee over a poll it is conducting to gauge the views of members and fellows on assisted dying.1

The college currently opposes assisted dying (that is, doctors being allowed to prescribe lethal drugs for terminally ill people to hasten their own death in specific situations). It has said that it will move to a neutral position unless at least 60% of votes in a poll being sent out in the first week of February are either in favour of or opposed to a change in the law.2 It intends to announce the results in March.

But John Saunders, an RCP fellow …