Health insurers should not be able to refuse help to patients who want to die in their own homes, a majority of MPs said during a debate on palliative care in the Netherlands.

MPs called on junior health minister Martin van Rijn to make sure that insurers are not able to refuse the wish of the terminally-ill to die at home, simply because they have not bought in enough care services.

Currently some people are being forced to stay in hospital or find themselves re-admitted to hospital even though they want to die at home or in a hospice, according to an RTL Nieuws report.

The broadcaster said one in five hospitals and hospices it spoke to reported that some patients were not being allowed to die at home because of the shortage of trained nursing staff.