I agree that assisted suicide or euthanasia should not be decriminalised or legalised. The lives of people who are terminally ill, frail, or have incurable conditions are of equal value to anyone else, and they deserve equal protection under the law.

Coping with terminal illness, or a severe incurable condition, is distressing and difficult for both the patient and their families. These cases are truly moving and evoke the highest degree of compassion and emotion. While the Director of Public Prosecutions has published guidelines primarily concerned with advising prosecutors about factors to consider when deciding whether it is in the public interest to prosecute a person for assisted suicide, these guidelines do not change the law. Assisting or encouraging suicide rightly remains a criminal offence.

You are also right to point out that groups such as the British Medical Association and leading disability rights groups are opposed to a change in the law, and that jurisdictions that have legalised assisted suicide have seen a number of unintended consequences that must not be replicated here.