RainAndSadness
Administrator
- Jun 12, 2018
- 2,146
I have missed this headline, it's from July actually but it's still newsworthy in my opinion as it marks another milestone in the fight for assisted suicide as a fundamental human right.
Here the situation. A doctor, Erika Preisig, was charged back in 2018 with potentially premeditated or negligent homicide for helping a mentally ill woman carry out assisted suicide without obtaining (ususally necessary) independant psychiatric reports first that would prove her mental capacity. The Swiss Federal Supreme Court has acquitted her now in a groundbreaking court ruling and this could set the framework for less restrictive assisted suicides in the future and therefore would make it easier for people suffering from mental illness to end their life in Switzerland. In the future, a psychiatric report might not be necessarily required to help mentally ill people commit suicide.
In the opinion of the court, talking to that woman, studying her medical records, talking to relatives and obtaining a second opinion was enough to assume mental capacity. So even in the absence of a psychiatric report the doctor had enough reason to assume that this woman, who suffered from an incurable and constant psychiatric impairment, was mentally competent. And this confirms what I've been saying all along in this forum by the way: mental illness does not indicate lack of mental capacity.
www.swissinfo.ch
I quote from the article:
Source
So while other countries still struggle to include non-terminally ill people in the process of assisted suicide or legalizing assisted suicide for anyone in the first place, Switzerland took it one step further, shaping the vision for a more progressive future.
Here the situation. A doctor, Erika Preisig, was charged back in 2018 with potentially premeditated or negligent homicide for helping a mentally ill woman carry out assisted suicide without obtaining (ususally necessary) independant psychiatric reports first that would prove her mental capacity. The Swiss Federal Supreme Court has acquitted her now in a groundbreaking court ruling and this could set the framework for less restrictive assisted suicides in the future and therefore would make it easier for people suffering from mental illness to end their life in Switzerland. In the future, a psychiatric report might not be necessarily required to help mentally ill people commit suicide.
In the opinion of the court, talking to that woman, studying her medical records, talking to relatives and obtaining a second opinion was enough to assume mental capacity. So even in the absence of a psychiatric report the doctor had enough reason to assume that this woman, who suffered from an incurable and constant psychiatric impairment, was mentally competent. And this confirms what I've been saying all along in this forum by the way: mental illness does not indicate lack of mental capacity.
Top court eases burden of proof for assisted suicide for mentally ill
The Swiss Federal Supreme Court has acquitted a doctor who helped a woman commit assisted suicide even in the absence of a psychiatric report.
www.swissinfo.ch
I quote from the article:
Source
So while other countries still struggle to include non-terminally ill people in the process of assisted suicide or legalizing assisted suicide for anyone in the first place, Switzerland took it one step further, shaping the vision for a more progressive future.
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