The Irish Medical Council has updated its ethical guidelines for doctors. The standout change—and a disturbing change, especially given the supposedly ethical focus—is the removal of the very explicit direction: “You must not take part in the deliberate killing of a patient.”  

The amendment to the 2024 Guide to Professional Conduct & Ethics for Registered Medical Practitioners comes in the section on “End of Life Care”. It was previously enshrined in the hitherto most recent edition (2016) of the guide as Article 46.9, providing the blunt, clear and unambiguous aforementioned command that proscribes doctors from being involved in euthanasia.   

The Iona Institute, an Irish organisation that promotes the place of marriage and religion in society, calls the revision "a huge change to the code of ethics that governs doctors in Ireland". It highlights that "the prohibition had been an age-old principal of medical ethics with roots going back to ancient Greece, so this represents a seismic shift".