November 20, 2024
It seems as if Switzerland has suddenly become afraid of its pioneering role
It seems as if Switzerland has suddenly become afraid of its pioneering role worldwide,’ says Nitschke, the inventor of Sarco.
For the first time, Philip Nitschke, the inventor of the suicide pill, talks about the Sarco premiere. He considers the criminal proceedings for intentional killing to be absurd.
In the interview, Nitschke talks about his next plans.
Simon Hehli, 20 November 2024, 5:30 a.m. 10 min
‘I’m an activist and I want the world to be a better place’: Sarco inventor Philip Nitschke is convinced of his mission.
Mr Nitschke, on 23 September a woman died for the first time in your Sarco suicide capsule. Did you feel a sense of triumph?
No, more a sense of relief that the Sarco, in which we had invested so much work, worked as planned. Just as we had predicted on a scientific basis. Above all, I was glad that the woman was able to die peacefully, as she had wished.
There had been discussions about whether hypoxia with nitrogen is really as peaceful and quick as all that. Also because of the experience with the execution in Alabama.
In January, a murderer was executed there with nitrogen for the first time. Before he died, he twitched violently and gasped for air.
I travelled to the US before the execution and tried to convince the authorities to stop the whole thing.
Unfortunately, it was unsuccessful. It is a completely different matter whether someone lies down in the Sarco voluntarily or whether a convict resists the execution.
Because in the latter case, the nitrogen mask has slipped, with all the terrible consequences.
Who was the American woman who died in the Sarco? What were her motives?
She was one of the people who contacted us after we made our plans with the Sarco in Switzerland public. I wasn’t involved in choosing this woman as the first Sarco user, but I looked at her health records. She had so many medical problems.
I fully understood her rational decision to end her suffering. I don’t want to say more about her.
Are you now being so reluctant with information because you were accused of creating a media circus and of showing Sarco users up, of exploiting them?
No, but she and her motives have been somewhat pushed into the background by all the incredible things that have happened after her death.
You are referring to the proceedings against your colleague Florian Willet. Why weren’t you in that Schaffhausen forest yourself during the Sarco premiere?
I installed the Sarco on site and tested it for several days. But I couldn’t be there on September 23. I had to give a lecture in Budapest and therefore had to be back in Amsterdam in time.
But of course I followed everything from afar. Florian knew what to do. I was not needed there.
Wasn’t it mainly about evading the Swiss authorities?
We were of course in close contact with our lawyers before 23 September. Their advice was that several people from our organisation should not be present at the same time.
From a legal point of view, it made sense for Florian to take on the role, also because he lives in Switzerland, is a lawyer and managing director of our Swiss branch The Last Resort.
Willet has been in custody for more than seven weeks. Were you surprised by the severity of the Schaffhausen judiciary’s action against your organisation?
To say I’m surprised would be a complete understatement. I am perplexed and deeply disturbed by what is happening here. We knew that there would be an investigation, that’s standard procedure.
But we were and are convinced that everything we do is in full compliance with Swiss law, so we were relaxed about it.
But when rumours started circulating that the Schaffhausen public prosecutor was investigating on suspicion of murder, I was horrified.
Traces of strangulation were said to have been found on the American woman’s neck.
That’s absurd! That’s supposedly what a phone memo says at the time of the autopsy. However, an autopsy report is still not available today.
I cannot understand why such a report should not be available after more than fifty days. And this while Florian is in custody.
In addition, the public prosecutor’s office apparently has documents according to which no DNA from Florian was found in the neck area of the deceased.
What happened in those minutes that you followed from afar?
I was able to see everything live through the cameras we had installed inside and outside the Sarco. I heard the conversations between Florian and the woman. I also monitored the oxygen level in the capsule. Everything went exactly as we had anticipated.
The woman entered the Sarco alone, closed the lid without assistance and independently pressed the button that released the nitrogen. She lost consciousness and died after about six minutes.
There are rumours that the Sarco did not work as planned. It is only a small step to speculate that Willet may have helped the woman to die.
I don’t know who starts these rumours. There isn’t the slightest shred of evidence for such a scenario. From the moment the woman entered the Sarco until the police arrived, no one opened the lid.
We documented everything, including the oxygen level in the capsule, which was always at a deadly level.
The public prosecutor apparently accuses you of not cooperating.
That’s not true. From the beginning, my wife and I wanted to come to Switzerland to make a statement. The public prosecutor refused this.
Instead, your office in Harlem was searched.
Yes, the Dutch police came by, presumably at the request of the Swiss authorities. I didn’t even get a list of the things they took – including a model of the Sarco.
The Sarco was first used in September in a forest hut near Merishausen in the canton of Schaffhausen. Here you can see the capsule at its presentation in Zurich this summer.
A second accusation that has been made is that you are offering the Sarco to help people kill themselves for selfish reasons – for example, to make money.
I am an activist and want the world to be a better place. That’s what I’ve been doing for thirty years. It’s not about making a profit with the Sarco, and there is no business model behind it.
Fortunately, we have enough money – also to further develop the Sarco.
How much has the development and production of the Sarco cost so far?
Almost a million dollars. There is a lot of technical innovation in the capsule, we have been working on it for almost ten years. And there have been some setbacks along the way.
Where does all this money come from?
From donations. There are many people who see what a step forward the Sarco is. It makes euthanasia so much easier.
Will the use of the Sarco always remain free, apart from the few francs for the nitrogen?
Yes. This is also an ethical question. We are convinced that you cannot charge money for an assisted death, especially when you consider that it is already very expensive for foreigners to travel to Switzerland if they want to die.
In doing so, you are challenging the Swiss assisted dying organisations, whose business model is to charge foreigners around 10,000 francs for their services. Is that why you accused these organisations of plotting against you?
I am very disappointed at how little openness there is among assisted suicide organisations regarding new technologies – and not only in Switzerland. I have only heard silly arguments against the Sarco.
For example, that nobody wants to die cut off from the world. That’s simply not true, otherwise we wouldn’t have had hundreds of interested people contacting us.
It’s a win-win situation when there is freedom of choice in assisted suicide.
‘Doctors are often overly critical of euthanasia,’ says 77-year-old Nitschke, who used to work as a doctor in Australia himself.
If you talk to local euthanasia activists, you will hear another accusation: that you want to make means of suicide easily accessible to everyone – including young, depressed people who act on impulse. Is that your goal?
Anyone who claims this has clearly misunderstood our motives and ambitions. We comply with Swiss law – and rightly so, as it stipulates that anyone seeking euthanasia must have mental capacity.
An 18-year-old suffering from lovesickness is, of course, not a Sarco candidate. As stated on The Last Resort website, the Sarco is generally only suitable for people aged 50 and over.
The accusation also arises from the fact that you published the book ‘The Peaceful Pill’ – in which you describe various suicide methods in detail.
I wrote the book for the members of our organisation Exit International. They are on average 75 years old.
There is a great need for information on euthanasia among older people, and they have every right to get this information. Many of our members have a lethal dose of pentobarbital in their cabinets and, thanks to the book, know how to use it.
This gives them great peace of mind. It was never my intention that young people could misuse the information to kill themselves. That’s why anyone who wants to buy my book has to prove by means of a video and ID that he or she is at least 50 years old.
One of your main arguments in favour of the Sarco is that it eliminates the need for doctors to prescribe the pentobarbital. Why is this so important to you?
The Swiss model is so much better than the regulations in most countries around the world. I have been repeating this for years when I travel around the world and speak to parliamentary commissions. I tell them: take Switzerland as an example.
But?
The problem is that in Switzerland, too, someone judges whether another person has suffered enough to be allowed to die. Doctors take on this role of judge. This is an unreasonable demand.
Doctors often take a hypercritical view of euthanasia. No, the decision must lie with the person concerned, not with some gatekeeper. The Sarco makes it possible.
The Swiss euthanasia organisations say that it is not a big problem to get hold of the deadly pentobarbital.
According to the current rules of the Swiss Medical Association, only those who are so ill that they are ‘unbearably suffering’ should receive euthanasia.
A few years ago, the well-known Australian botanist David Goodall wanted to die in Switzerland. The man was 104 years old and simply tired of life. He would have had to pretend to be ill, but understandably refused to do so. He had a hard time finding a doctor who would help him anyway.
Do you have no sympathy for the fears that the Sarco would further boost ‘death tourism’ in Switzerland?
I don’t think that the situation would change much. There are already many people coming to Switzerland who are grateful for our progressive rules. The Swiss should be proud of that!
Take a look at the UK, for example; I am following the debate there very closely. There is supposed to be a new law on assisted dying. It will be so restrictive that many Britons will continue to feel compelled to travel to Switzerland to die.
But precisely these liberal rules could now be jeopardised by the whole furore over Sarco – because some politicians see an opportunity to regulate euthanasia more strictly.
I’m not particularly impressed by this argument. It’s easy to object to any kind of innovation: why should we change something? We’ve got it all set up comfortably. But the current solution is not ideal for people seeking help in dying. That’s why the Sarco is needed.
It seems as if Switzerland has suddenly become afraid of its liberal legislation and its pioneering role worldwide.
Did you underestimate how critically Swiss politicians view your capsule?
Minister of the Interior Elisabeth Baume-Schneider said that its use is not legally compliant – almost exactly at the same time that you used the Sarco for the first time.
I have no idea how Ms Baume-Schneider came to such an assessment. It contradicts all the assessments of Swiss lawyers that we have obtained. And also of professors who spoke out after the Sarco premiere.
Of course, it was not planned by us that the first use took place exactly at the time when the responsible minister commented on the Sarco. That was an unfortunate coincidence.
The serious accusations made against you by Jennifer McLaughlin have also caused a stir. The woman who was supposed to be the first to die in the Sarco called you and your fellow campaigners ‘heartless people’ and said that your only concern was to generate publicity. How did it come to this rift?
It was a mistake that we chose her in the first place. I wish we had realised this sooner. She had serious psychological problems, and I myself witnessed episodes of this nature in her. I emphatically reject her accusations, which have been proven to be untrue.
That is why your newspaper has at least partially retracted these accusations.
[Editor’s Note – in a legally-binding agreement NZZ were forced to correct their erroneous reporting in what is understood to be one of the biggest corrections in the newspaper’s recent history]
Before McLaughlin died at the hands of a Swiss assisted suicide organisation, a psychiatrist stated in an expert report that she was of sound mind. Are you accusing him of having botched the report?
No. But unlike me, he didn’t have the opportunity to accompany Jennifer over a longer period of time. I was a doctor long enough to know that an assessment of mental state also depends on the patient’s state on the day.
You are implicitly saying that the Swiss organisation violated the rules by helping a mentally ill woman to commit suicide. That’s a serious accusation.
They can do whatever they want, it’s none of my business. I’m just glad the woman didn’t die in the Sarco.
Now the question is whether and when the Sarco will be used again. Will you wait until the proceedings against Florian Willet are over?
Yes, definitely. We want a clear decision from the judiciary before we bring Sarco number two, which is currently being produced, to Switzerland. Sarco number one, with all its innovative software, is still confiscated.
The investigation can only have one outcome: that the Sarco does not violate a single Swiss law.
The legal process could take months or even years. Are you looking at alternatives to Switzerland?
I hope it will be quick. But there are other places we could take the Sarco. For example, to Finland, where, according to our lawyers, there is no specific law banning assisted suicide.
Another possibility remains that people who want to die can make the Sarco themselves using a 3D printer, get in and press the button. No country in the world can forbid someone to commit suicide.