THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The Dutch government plans to draft a new law that would allow people who consider their lives to be "completed" to get help to die "in a dignified way," a move welcomed Thursday by the country's leading right-to-die organization but criticized by some opposition lawmakers and a group for the elderly. 
 
 The proposal is the latest step in the development of the liberal Dutch mercy-killing law first adopted in 2002. Euthanasia under strict conditions was legalized that year for people facing unbearable suffering, making the Netherlands one of the few countries in the world where mercy killing is allowed. 
 
 The government announced late Wednesday that it now wants to help people who may not have a specific medical complaint but are suffering and want to die because they consider their lives to be completed. 
 
 The announcement came as a surprise as an independent commission concluded earlier this year that the current euthanasia legislation did not need to be amended. The commission said the number of people who want to take their own life and did not fit the existing guidelines was likely very small. 
 
 The plan, which will likely trigger months of discussions to develop legislation that then has to pass both houses of the Dutch Parliament, drew mixed reactions on Thursday. Opponents said they feared it could put lonely elderly people under pressure to end their lives and supporters said it would give such people the right to decide when to end their lives. 
 
 Gert-Jan Segers, leader of the faith-based ChristenUnie political party, called the move "horrifying" and said it "imperils the care for and security of the elderly." 
 
 Manon Vanderkaa, who directs two Christian senior citizen organizations, said the proposal was "unnecessary and undesirable. To "help dying, however well regulated, is the wrong answer for a much more profound problem" for vulnerable and lonely elderly people, Vanderkaa said. 
 
 But Netherlands Society for Voluntary End of Life director Robert Schurink welcomed the plan, saying it would help people without physical ailments that would make them eligible for euthanasia under the existing law and create a careful regulatory framework for people wishing to end their lives. 
 
 "This law recognizes that there is a problem with the functioning of the current euthanasia law in cases of completed lives. It acknowledges that there can be existential suffering," Schurink said in a telephone interview. ||||| The Dutch health and justice ministers say the proposed law would be limited to the elderly 
 
 Netherlands may extend assisted dying to those who feel 'life is complete' 
 
 The Dutch government intends to draft a law that would legalise assisted suicide for people who feel they have “completed life” but are not necessarily terminally ill. 
 
 
 
 The Netherlands was the first country to legalise euthanasia, in 2002, but only for patients who were considered to be suffering unbearable pain with no hope of a cure. 
 
 But in a letter to parliament on Wednesday, the health and justice ministers said that people who “have a well-considered opinion that their life is complete, must, under strict and careful criteria, be allowed to finish that life in a manner dignified for them”. 
 
 Assisted dying: what can the UK learn from places where it is legal? Read more 
 
 The proposal is likely to provoke critics who say the scope of Dutch euthanasia policy has already expanded beyond its original boundaries, with “unbearable suffering” not only applying to people with terminal diseases but also to some with mental illnesses and dementia. 
 
 The euthanasia policy has widespread backing in Dutch society, and cases have risen by double digits every year for more than a decade as more patients request it and more doctors are willing to carry it out. Euthanasia accounted for 5,516 deaths in the Netherlands in 2015, or 3.9% of all deaths nationwide. 
 
 Edith Schippers, the health minister, wrote in the letter that “because the wish for a self-chosen end of life primarily occurs in the elderly, the new system will be limited to” them. 
 
 She did not define a threshold age. 
 
 Although details remained to be worked out, the new law would require “careful guidance and vetting ahead of time with a ‘death assistance provider’ with a medical background, who has also been given additional training”. 
 
 Other aspects of the law would include safety mechanisms including third-party checks, reviews and supervision, she said. 
 
 My patient ended her life at Dignitas to avoid a slow, undignified death Read more 
 
 The proposal comes as a surprise because a commission enlisted to study the idea of allowing a “completed life” extension to current policy concluded there was no need for it. 
 
 The ministers disagreed. “The cabinet is of the opinion that a request for help (in dying) from people who suffer unbearably and have no hope without an underlying medical reason can be a legitimate request“. 
 
 They hope to draft a law, in consultation with doctors, ethicists and other experts, by the end of 2017.
– Already, the Netherlands allows assisted suicide for those who are terminally ill or living with "unbearable suffering." Soon, people who feel they have nothing more to do in life might get the same freedom. In a letter to Parliament on Wednesday, the country's health and justice ministers wrote that elderly people—an exact age wasn't given—with "a well-considered opinion that their life is complete, must, under strict and careful criteria, be allowed to finish that life in a manner dignified for them," reports Reuters. They hope to draft a law by the end of next year, though a commission found the extension to the euthanasia policy to be excessive. A group for elderly people likewise calls it "unnecessary and undesirable," reports the AP. Almost 4% of Dutch deaths in 2015 came under the euthanasia law, expanded since 2012 to include those suffering from certain mental illnesses and dementia. Still, "the Cabinet is of the opinion that a request for help (in dying) from people who suffer unbearably and have no hope without an underlying medical reason can be a legitimate request," the ministers say. The proposed law will lay out the need for checks, reviews, and supervision and will be vetted by a "death assistance provider," the health minister adds. (A child was just euthanized in Belgium.)