February 18, 2010:   In accordance with the Belgian Euthanasia Law a 16 person Federal Euthanasia Review Committee assesses every case of Termination of life on request (that is reported!), and reports every two years to the Belgian Parliament. Recently the numbers of reported cases in 2008 and 2009 were already published, in advance of the official report expected this year.

  February 15, 2010:  A research team of the VUB (Brussels Free University), headed by professor Lieve de Bock, explored the relation between the care provided in the final three months of life and the prevalence and types of end of life decisions in Belgium. It concerned a two year nationwide retrospective study.

/  January 31, 2010 Two researchgroups from Belgium and the Netherlands (the End-of-life Care Research Group from VU Brussels and the EMGO VUmc Amsterdam group) published a theoretical study into the practice of End-of-Life Consultation Services, developped in both countries: Establishing specialized health services for professional consultation in euthanasia: experiences in the Netherlands and Belgium.

September 28, 2009: Pour des lecteurs francophones, voici une traduction francaise de la conférence de Dr Rodney Syme, conférencier-invité principal à la Faculté de Droit de l'Université de

September 10, 2009: The New England Journal of Medicine today (NEJM 361;11,

A criminal case was launched on 8 July 2000 after the suicide of Jean-Marie Lorand, who was accompanied by his doctor. On 6 June 2005 the Appeal Court of Mons finally dismissed the case.

A GP from Ostend was arrested on 29 July and imprisoned for four days, accused of having ended the lives of 5 patients in a care home over the last 3 years by increasing their doses of morphine. The management of the home brought the case. The case remain粑

A nurse who was imprisoned for three months in 2000, with her parents, after having given a lethal injection to an aunt suffering from a liver disease has recently been told by her lawyer that the case is to be referred to the courts where she will be acc粑

There is an initiative of drug company Multipharma, which has decided to make available in all its pharmacies a pack containing all the products a doctor would need in carrying out an approved euthanasia.