Assisted Suicide Shown On Sky TV

The moment a terminally ill man takes his own life will be screened in a television programme tonight.
Sky TV Documentary makers were allowed to film the final moments of 59-year-old motor neurone disease sufferer Craig Ewert at controversial Swiss clinic Dignitas.

The Sky Real Lives programme Right to Die?, shows Mr Ewert drinking a fatal dose of barbiturates, which have been prescribed by a local doctor.

Within 30 minutes of the overdose he is dead.

Before making the journey, he said: "If I go through with it I die, as I must at some point.

"If I don't go through with it, my choice is essentially to suffer and to inflict suffering on my family and then die.

"Possibly in a way that is considerably more stressful and painful than this way."

Mr Ewert, who lived in Harrogate, feared the disease would end up choking him to death.

His widow, Mary, has defended the decision to allow the cameras inside the clinic, which helps people to commit suicide.

Assisted suicide is legal in Switzerland with certain conditions. But it is illegal in Britain.

The programme comes as a coroner recorded a verdict of suicide following the death of another British man at Dignitas.

Paralysed rugby player Daniel James, 23, was injured when a scrum collapsed on him. The promising hooker lost the use of all of his limbs.

According to his parents, Mr James found his life unbearable. They helped him travel to Zurich in September this year.

The Director of Public Prosecutions has decided not to pursue a case against the couple.

Dignitas was set up by Ludwig Minelli, a lawyer who rarely gives interviews. He said a dignified death is a human right.

The clinic has helped more than 100 people from Britain to end their lives.

But, to some religious and ethical groups, assisted suicide is wrong.

Dr Rob George, from Care Not Killing, said Mr Ewert's death was barbaric and that "a natural death is nothing to fear".

"The vast majority of patients with motor neurone disease do not have a choking, unpleasant, suffocating death. That's just not true. So I feel sad and quite angry about that. This man need not have gone through this."