Germany: The campaign for euthanasia

Kusch administered Bettina S. a deadly dose of chemicals consisting of anti-malaria serum and psychopharmacologic drugs. In order to avoid prosecution under Germanys current law, he left her apartment just prior to her death. He did, however, install a video camera that recorded her last moments. Following her death Kusch returned to the apartment and took away the camera.

He then informed the press and showed video clips of the woman prior to her death in which she is seen smoking and breathing heavily, but who in all other respects made a healthy and alert impression.

Kusch declared that the reason given by the woman for her planned suicide two months before her 80 birthday was her fear of being admitted to a nursing home. She was neither poor nor seriously ill. Nevertheless, as Kusch explained in an interview to German radio on July 3: The notion that her life would now be determined by strangers, that she lies in a strange bed, and a sister with a faint smile on her lips asks her in the morning how she isthis notion was dreadful for her ... she wanted to be the one to decide on her life and decide who entered her room.

When asked why he had not offered to help Bettina S. and advise her against suicide, Kusch answered, That went far too over my head and that it would not have been possible to dissuade the woman from her planned course of action. He felt it would be contemptible and disrespectful to persuade the woman not to kill herself. He stressed that the individuals right to self-determination should apply up to the last breath.

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