Jules Netherland traveled from her home in the Bronx to the New York state Capitol in Albany several times in the past few years, hoping to persuade the legislature to pass a medical aid in dying bill, allowing terminally ill patients to end their lives with a lethal prescription. She spoke at rallies.
With other members of the advocacy organization Compassion & Choices, she visited legislators’ offices. In 2024, as the state Assembly was debating the aid in dying bill, she helped unfurl a banner in the chamber gallery that read, “Stop the Suffering.” Her activism was becoming difficult.
Netherland, who is 59 and works for a nonprofit, was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2019. “I did a full year of aggressive treatment,” she said.
“Chemotherapy. A mastectomy.
Radiation treatment every weekday for five weeks. Six months of two oral medications.” She recovered and felt well until the cancer returned a few years later.
Although metastatic breast cancer is incurable, drugs are keeping her disease at bay for now.
KFF Health News published a clinical update in Research Highlights on 08 Jun 2026.
The item focuses on By September, Nearly a Third of Americans Will Live in States With Legal Aid in Dying.
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