{"id":279515,"date":"2022-11-11T06:47:43","date_gmt":"2022-11-11T12:47:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=279515"},"modified":"2023-11-06T16:34:10","modified_gmt":"2023-11-06T22:34:10","slug":"gas-chamber-death-pods-coming-scotland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/gas-chamber-death-pods-coming-scotland\/","title":{"rendered":"Are gas chamber ‘death pods’ now coming to Scotland?"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

(Right to Life UK<\/a>) The creator of \u2018suicide capsules\u2019, which gas the user to death, is lobbying members of the Scottish parliament to make use of his machine should Scotland make assisted suicide legal.<\/p>\n

The capsules, dubbed \u2018DIY death pods\u2019, are called \u2018Sarco\u2019 pods. They were created by former physician, Dr Philip Nitschke, and were launched in Switzerland where assisted suicide is legal. In an interview with SWI swissinfo.ch given in 2021, Nitschke said<\/a> \u201cIt\u2019s a 3-D printed capsule, activated from the inside by the person intending to die. The machine can be towed anywhere for the death\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe person will get into the capsule and lie down \u2026 They will be asked a number of questions and when they have answered, they may press the button inside the capsule activating the mechanism in their own time\u201d.<\/p>\n

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Describing the actual manner of death, Nitschke said \u201cThe capsule is sitting on a piece of equipment that will flood the interior with nitrogen, rapidly reducing the oxygen level to 1 per cent from 21 per cent in about 30 seconds. The person will feel a little disoriented and may feel slightly euphoric before they lose consciousness. Death takes place through hypoxia and hypocapnia, oxygen and carbon dioxide deprivation, respectively\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nitschke is not the first person to invent and promote the use of a suicide machine. In the 1990s, Jack Kevorkian<\/a> built a \u201cdeath machine\u201d in his van and helped over 100 people commit suicide using it. In 1999, he was convicted of murder.<\/p>\n

\u2018DIY death pods\u2019 coming to Scotland?<\/strong><\/p>\n

According to the Scottish Daily Express<\/a>, Nitschke has written to Liam McArthur, the Liberal Democrat MSP who has launched an assisted suicide Bill in Holyrood, urging him to adopt his \u2018DIY death pods\u2019.<\/p>\n

However, Chief Executive of Care Not Killing, Dr Gordon Macdonald, was deeply alarmed by this proposal saying<\/a> \u201cOrdinary people will be shocked and appalled at Philip Nitschke\u2019s attempt to lobby for the use of his personal gas chamber should Scotland legalise assisted suicide and euthanasia\u201d.<\/p>\n

He also said that this \u201cshocking\u201d suggestion was \u201cnot the most worrying part of the debate\u201d pointing to countries like Canada where assisted suicide can \u201cspin out of control\u201d.<\/p>\n

He said \u201cYou can now have your life ended if you are suffering from mental health conditions such as treatable clinical depression, PTSD, disability, diabetes and a combination of other ailments.<\/p>\n

\u201cIndeed last year, 1,700, mainly elderly, people cited loneliness as a reason for their euthanasia, while we have seen applications from disabled people who are struggling to pay for the cost of their care, even a homeless man who no longer wants to live on the streets\u201d.<\/p>\n

Assisted suicide often fails<\/strong><\/p>\n

While Nitschke suggests that death would take five to ten minutes, physicians from countries that have already made assisted suicide and euthanasia legal tell a different story. Dr Brick Lantz, orthopaedic surgeon and state director of the American Academy of Medical Ethics, emphasised<\/a> that it is not uncommon for an assisted suicide to go wrong.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe failures are brutal when someone fails assisted suicide and the failures are not infrequent. In fact, there was one that woke up from a coma after multiple days. There was a nurse at the bedside of one who ended up putting a plastic bag over the patient to kill the patient because they weren\u2019t dying\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n

One in five cite loneliness as a reason to want to die<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 2021, 10,064 people<\/a> ended their lives by assisted suicide and euthanasia, an increase of over 32% from the previous year, accounting for 3.3% of all deaths in Canada.<\/p>\n

According to the latest report<\/a> on Medical Assistance in Dying\u00a0 from Health Canada, 17.3% of people also cited \u201cisolation or loneliness\u201d as a reason for wanting to die. In 35.7% of cases, patients believed that they were a \u201cburden on family, friends or caregivers\u201d.<\/p>\n

End-of-life concerns are not medical<\/strong><\/p>\n

Statistics from the state of Oregon, which made assisted suicide legal in 1997, tell a similar story. The Oregon Health Authority report for 2021<\/a> says that 54.2% of patients were concerned with being a \u201cburden on family, friends\/caregivers\u201d. 92% of patients were concerned with being \u201c[l]ess able to engage in activities making life enjoyable\u201d. 93.3% were concerned with \u201closing autonomy\u201d and 68.1% were concerned with \u201closs of dignity\u201d. Of the total who have died since 1997, 27.5% have listed \u201cinadequate pain control, or concern about it\u201d as one of their end-of-life concerns.<\/p>\n

Right To Life UK spokesperson Catherine Robinson said \u201cThe data from Oregon and Canada both show that assisted suicide and euthanasia are being used as a \u2018solution\u2019 to social and psychological problems. People suffering from loneliness, or who fear being a burden or losing autonomy, are not suffering from a medical condition. Our society should not be encouraging people to end their lives as a \u2018solution\u2019 to these problems but this is exactly what the \u2018DIY death pod\u2019 does. As Dr Macdonald rightly says, the focus should be on palliative care and not a \u2018dangerous and ideological policy\u2019 that threatens the lives of the most vulnerable\u201d.<\/p>\n

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published at Right to Life UK<\/a> and is reprinted here with permission.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Right to Life UK) The creator of \u2018suicide capsules\u2019, which gas the user to death, is lobbying members of the Scottish parliament to make use of his machine should Scotland make assisted suicide legal. The capsules, dubbed \u2018DIY death pods\u2019, are called \u2018Sarco\u2019 pods. They were created by former physician, Dr Philip Nitschke, and were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":669,"featured_media":258618,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[7077,4],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nAre gas chamber 'death pods' now coming to Scotland?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The creator of suicide pods that gas users to death is asking members of the Scottish parliament to allow his machine if assisted suicide is legalized.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/righttolife.org.uk\/news\/philip-nitschke-campaigning-for-gas-chamber-death-pod-scheme-for-scotland\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Are gas 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