On Wednesday, California’s top doctors group said it would stay neutral on a controversial bill that allows physician-assisted suicide.

The bill, under consideration by state legislature, is called the ‘End of Life Option’ Act. It is in favor of terminal patients’ requirement to end their own lives though medical assistance.

It would allow the patients who are left with six months to live and have been considered mentally competent to obtain prescriptions to end their lives.

It has been inspired from Brittany Maynard, the 29-year-old California woman who moved to Oregon to end her own life under that state’s ‘Death with Dignity’ law. She was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer and moved to Oregon to take advantage of that state’s law. She died in November.

If the bill is approved, it would make California one of a handful of states in the US to remove prohibitions on doctors to aid aiding terminal patients.

The move by the California Medical Association (CMA) was hailed by backers of the End of Life Options Act as a landmark step.

Dr. Luther Cobb, CMA’s president, said, “As physicians, we want to provide the best care possible for our patients. However, despite the remarkable medical breakthroughs we’ve made and the world-class hospice or palliative care we can provide, it isn’t always enough”.

According to him, the decision end life is a very personal one between a doctor and their patient. Therefore, CMA has removed policy that outright objects to physicians to aid terminally ill patients.

The CMA has altered its position on the state bill by switched from opposing the bill to a neutral stance. This it has become the only state medical group of its kind in the United States, which is not in to not against physician-assisted suicide.

Patients such as local mother and former LAPD officer Christy O’Donnell, 46 has sparked an emotional debate over whether California should join Oregon in legalizing an Aid-in-Dying bill.

O’Donnell said, “I can’t take any more pain. I don’t want to suffer anymore, and we don’t want to see our loved ones watching us suffer anymore”.