EuthaNEWSia (www.euthanewsia.ca)

The Wall Street Journal profiles Ludwig A. Minelli, founder of Dignitas, the Swiss assisted suicide organization that has helped more than 1,000 people die since 1998: Lately, the increasingly controversial activities of Dignitas and its founder, Ludwig Minelli, are pushing even the famously tolerant Swiss too far, prompting calls for changes in the nation's assisted-suicide law. Mr. Minelli has long played the agent provocateur of Switzerland's right-to-die movement, most notably because his group helps the lion's share of foreigners who come to Switzerland seeking to end their lives. . . .

In the 1980s, he says, a memory of his seriously ill grandmother's pleading in vain with her doctor to help her die left him with a particular interest in Switzerland's growing right-to-die movement, and he joined one of the main groups. In 1998, he quit to found Dignitas. . . .

A vote is planned in March on a bill that would sharply restrict the activities of right-to-die organizations. For instance, two doctors must testify that a person is terminally ill, thus ruling out assistance for the chronically or mentally ill. The person seeking help must have given long consideration to his wish to die before doctors can prescribe lethal drugs. Moreover, right-to-die groups would be barred from accepting payments beyond those covering the costs of the suicide. The government also tabled a second bill that would ban assisted suicides altogether.

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Ball, Deborah and Julia Mengewein. "Assisted-Suicide Pioneer Stirs a Legal Backlash in Switzerland". Wall Street Journal. February 6, 2010. <online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703414504575001363599545120.html>. The Wall Street Journal, 1211 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10036, U.S.A.

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The EuthaNEWSia ID for this advisory is: enid201002089486.
Mailed: Monday, February 8, 2010 13:46:34 -0600
at Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

EuthaNEWSia is a free Canadian news advisory service covering end-of-life issues such as right to die, assisted suicide, and euthanasia. EuthaNEWSia is produced by the Right to Die Society of Canada which works toward a good death for all, including open, regulated and equitable access to euthanasia and assisted suicide. The editor is Michael Dawson <editor@euthanewsia.ca>.

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