(Brussels) If sedation is used “in end-of-life care”, care must be taken to ensure that it does not open the way “for sedative practices conducted not only to spare the patient from feeling pain, but also to hasten the moment of death deliberately” since “such forms of sedation deserve to be qualified as acts of euthanasia”. This is according to the Opinion on “Palliative care in the European Union” which has just been released by the COMECE Working Group on Ethics in Research and Healthcare. The extensive document also looks into the use of anxiolytics to reduce “unease and anxiety”, recommending a “cautious and measured use” to get relief from anxiety, in a way that it is still possible “to communicate with the patient and to interact with him”. Attention is also paid to the blurred demarcation line between palliative care, on the one hand, and “aggressive medical treatment” and euthanasia, on the other. As research advances, there is a need to “enshrine in the legislation of each Member State a right to access to palliative care”, with particular attention to “groups of people who are especially vulnerable”. Member States should create a sufficient number of institutions adapted to the needs of each country, and staff training should include the acquisition not just “of competencies in pain management”, but also of skills on how to “approach and take into account the social, emotional and spiritual needs” of each individual patient.