A bill that would allow the terminally ill to obtain life-ending drugs from their physicians has been rejected by a Senate committee. The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Democrat Joe Dunn, cast the decisive vote against the bill. He said he feared the measure could lead to a broader use of assisted suicide than contemplated by its authors because of future pressures to cut medical costs. "In this society, more often than not, public policy decisions are driven unfortunately by money concerns, not by policy concerns," said Dunn.

Dunn sided with a Republican senator against two Democrats in the 2-2 vote Tuesday. The fifth committee member, Republican Sen. Bill Morrow, was absent, but aides said he also opposed the bill. The legislation would allow a physician to prescribe a self-administered, life-ending drug for an adult who had been found by two doctors to be mentally competent and within six months of death. The bill's chief author, Democratic Assemblywoman Patty Berg, said the eight-year experience with a similar law in Oregon showed that Dunn's fears were unfounded. 

"There has never been any question among rational people that this practice would be expanded and offered to people who are not dying," she said. But Susan Penney, an attorney for the California Medical Association, said the Oregon law had not been in effect long enough to ensure that it would not be extended to cover more than the terminally ill. "It's entirely premature to argue that there is no slippery slope," she said.

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