Your Turn

by Tom Bretz
Guest columnist
The Enquirer/cincinnati.com, Forum, 9B
February 22, 2026

I have led a fortunate life: I’ve enjoyed career success as an engineer and a corporate turnaround specialist; I have a loving family and an enduring relationship with my partner of 20 years; and, at 76, even after a serious bicycle crash a few years ago, my health is good enough for me to enjoy hiking, climbing, racing my car and lots of other fun things.

One thread running through it all: I’ve been free to choose my own path and direct my own life. I believe this kind of autonomy is not only every person’s right, but absolutely necessary to truly live one’s best life.

As Americans, we enjoy a great deal of personal freedom, but in many states — including Ohio — there’s a significant exception: As we near the end of life, too many of us lose the autonomy we may have taken for granted all our lives. Because Ohio doesn’t allow access to medical aid in dying, a terminal disease diagnosis makes us captives to the possibility of prolonged suffering. 

Unfortunately, I’ve seen a lot of that suffering. I still remember my grandfather’s pain-wracked passing from lung cancer when I was 5 years old. My father’s death from emphysema was brutal, and my grandmother suffered before dying of cancer when I was 19. A close friend from high school developed leukemia at 29 and passed after an agonizing few months.

These experiences have stuck with me, and they’re a big part of why I’m working to bring about a medical aid in dying, or MAID, law in Ohio. In addition, I was diagnosed with prostate cancer 20 years ago and received radiation treatment for it four years ago. While it isn’t immediately life-threatening, it fuels my determination to help win terminally ill Ohioans the right to choose a peaceful, fear-free end when death is imminent.

 I’m a volunteer with and board member for Ohio End of Life Options, a statewide organization working toward that goal. I also have volunteered with Compassion & Choices, a national MAID advocacy organization. I’m hoping to use some of the skills that served my professional career to organize a group of supporters here in the Cincinnati area.

MAID is a clearly outlined process: A person who is dying — who has been diagnosed with a terminal illness and has a prognosis of six months or less to live — can ask a doctor for a prescription that, when taken, will end the person’s life quickly and painlessly. It is directed by the patient and no one else. Every U.S. jurisdiction where MAID is legal has enacted effective safeguards. These include:

• The patient must be an adult and have decision-making capacity
• The patient must make the request twice orally and a third time in writing. The written request must be witnessed by two people, neither of whom can be in a position to gain financially by the person’s death.
• The patient must independently self-administer the medication. 

MAID doesn’t mean giving up on palliative care and the tremendous benefits of hospice; these are the bedrock of compassionate care, and the vast majority of people who use MAID are enrolled in hospice. But terminal patients may suffer pain that no existing therapies can ease. Having access to MAID allows patients to live what’s left of their lives without constant fear of a traumatic ending. It frees their loved ones from similar anxieties and allows them all to prepare for a planned, peaceful death. 

MAID has been helping grant that peace for terminally ill Americans for nearly three decades, since Oregon’s voter-approved Death with Dignity Act was enacted in 1997. Since then, 12 other states and the District of Columbia have legalized MAID.  2026 brings significant progress, with Delaware, Illinois and New York all set to implement new MAID laws. I’m encouraged by this momentum and hope to see it extend to Ohio.

There’s no doubt that some people oppose the idea of MAID, often based on religious convictions. That is their right. I am a committed Christian, but part of my belief system is that those beliefs are my own, and I have no right or wish to impose them on others. I’m a strong believer in individual rights.

People who access MAID want to live, but they have a disease that will end their lives. MAID gives them agency over how that end unfolds. 

If my cancer progresses to a point at which it can no longer be treated and I’m facing the end of my days, I’d like to be able to determine what my final day looks like.

I look forward to connecting with others in southwest Ohio who value end-of-life autonomy and want to take this movement to the Statehouse.

Tom Bretz is a business executive who retired as a partner in a factory direct mattress business in 2014. He settled in West Chester after living in 16 cities and seven states