LYSIS Archive · Research and Care

Uruguay, a Model for Latin America

Published on LYSIS on 16 October 2025

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Death, that radical absence that is paradoxically a constant presence in our lives, reveals to us the limits of the will, the point at which suffering ceases to serve life and becomes an intolerable burden. Defending the dignity of death, which seems so frowned upon in Brazil, is no celebration of dissolution. It is an acknowledgment that individual autonomy, compassion, and institutional responsibility must work together to alleviate inescapable suffering where there is no reasonable remedy. I repeat: where there is no reasonable remedy and where the person whose life it is has made a decision.

Consider Uruguay on this day, October 16, 2025. The Senate, a public body entrusted with hope and anguish, has finally approved the bill known as “Muerte Digna,” a genuine legislative watershed authorizing euthanasia in certain extreme cases. In August of this year, the Chamber of Deputies had already approved the bill by a substantial majority, with sixty-four votes in favor. Today the Senate took the decisive step. This legislative process did not arise overnight. Behind it lie years of hearings, committee reports, and participation by medical, religious, and civic associations. The legislation reflects a concern for rigor and democratic oversight.

The final text approved by the Uruguayan Senate sets out criteria that strike me as measured: eligibility for adults with decision-making capacity who are experiencing unbearable suffering or have an incurable illness, multiple independent medical assessments, a regulatory commission, and exemption from criminal and civil liability for professionals who act within the terms of the law. It also provides for formal registration of the request and for witnesses. The procedure is treated as equivalent to a natural death for legal and administrative purposes.

Two things seem clear to me as a matter of political ethics. First, euthanasia and assisted suicide are medical questions and political questions in the strictest sense. The state has a duty to legislate, protect, establish safeguards, and create transparent processes of deliberation. That is exactly what the Uruguayan bill sought to implement and has now put into law. Second, well-designed legalization does not diminish palliative care. When accompanied by clear rules, it encourages public investment and an ethical commitment across society to make palliative care genuinely and equitably available. Critics, including medical specialists, emphasize the need for oversight, universal access to palliative care, and regulation of procedures. The text as approved contains several such provisions.

Why, then, is Uruguay a model for Brazil? Because Uruguay shows that we need not shut down dialogue in an effort to avoid suffering. Its legislative process shows that a secular state can respect religious convictions while protecting individual autonomy. It can also allow health professionals to exercise moral reservations through conscientious objection while fulfilling its duty to offer a lawful and safe alternative. The approved text includes those safeguards.

Brazil faces two principal tasks:

a) Broaden public, institutional, and pluralistic debate. Move beyond an exchange of defenses or expressions of horror about euthanasia and assisted suicide. Involve patients, caregivers, health professionals, lawyers, and the wider public. Let us remember with Kant that enlightenment and an enlightened society are possible only through the public use of reason.
b) Design rules that ensure equitable access to palliative care and clearly define who will review decisions and who will be accountable. This can help prevent inequalities or a situation in which someone chooses death out of despair rather than through a conscious decision.

In closing, legislating on death with dignity protects the ultimate right to decide when suffering has become inhumane. It makes the state and society responsible for creating the conditions for an informed, free, and safe decision. The aim is to safeguard that right, rather than promote death. Uruguay took a decisive step today. It became the first country in Latin America (I will discuss the differences with Colombia in another article) to approve euthanasia by statute under certain conditions. It shows that even at the furthest limit, as life reaches its boundary, it is possible to enact secular, regulated, humane laws subject to scrutiny. May Brazil look courageously at this example and widen its own debate, because the dignity of death cannot wait.

Professor and student, Alexandre H. Reis.