The Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has issued a statement strongly reaffirming the Church's ban on euthanasia as "intrinsically evil." The CDF statement, released on September 22, 2020, comes in response to a new drive for legal acceptance of physician-assisted suicide, particularly in European nations. Cardinal Luis Ladaria, the prefect of the CDF, told reporters that at a plenary session in 2018, the members of the congregation had agreed on "the expediency of a document that would deal with this, not only in a doctrinally correct manner, but also using strong pastoral tones and comprehensible language, in keeping with the progress of the medical sciences." The Vatican statement is addressed not merely to the issue of euthanasia, but to the broader issue of "the care of persons in the critical and terminal phases of life." The statement itself acknowledges: "It is widely recognized that a moral and practical clarification regarding care of these persons is needed."