Many foreigners travel to Switzerland to end their lives with the assistance of an organisation. In Switzerland, assisted suicide is legal under certain conditions. But choosing this path without being terminally ill continues to shock many and raise ethical questions.\n<\/p>\n
When I first read Franz Kafka\u2019s The Judgment, one line stayed with me after the protagonist\u2019s suicide: \u201cAt that moment an almost endless traffic rolled across the bridge\u2026\u201d My interpretation being, that, even in death and loss, life goes on for many \u2013 uninterrupted.<\/p>\n
For 56-year-old Wendy Duffy, this is not the case. Her son, Marcus, choked to death in front of her four years ago. Since then, she has undergone years of therapy but says she has been unable to come to terms with his death.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s when I died too, inside. I\u2019m not the same person now as I was\u2026 I don\u2019t care about anything anymore. I exist. I don\u2019t live.\u201d<\/p>\n
After an unsuccessful suicide attempt that left her on a ventilator in a \u201cvegetative state\u201d for two weeks, Duffy applied to the assisted suicide organisation Pegasos and after months of evaluation received approval late last year.<\/p>\n
Founded in 2019, Pegasos primarily serves foreigners. Its conditions are straightforward: applicants must be over 18, mentally competent and able to pay around CHF10,000 ($12,711). Unlike some other Swiss organisations, Pegasos does not require applicants to suffer from an incurable illness.<\/p>\n
For the past year, Duffy has been counting down the remaining time on her phone. In just a few days, the moment will come. \u201cI have to administer the medication myself; that\u2019s what the law requires,\u201d she explains. Her final request is for her ashes to be scattered alongside those of her son. \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Many foreigners travel to Switzerland to end their lives with the assistance of an organisation. In Switzerland, assisted…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55129,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[8516,50,1210,1455,1002,1211,17],"class_list":["post-55128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-switzerland","tag-agriculture","tag-alps","tag-beat-swiss-abroad","tag-finance-general","tag-health","tag-home-swiss-abroad","tag-switzerland"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/116460705937921257","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55128\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55129"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}