In the Netherlands, euthanasia was written into the law in 2001. The law went into effect in 2002, which makes the country one of the most progressive when it comes to euthanasia. In 1996, Philip Nitschke became the first doctor to legally administer a deadly injection to one of his patients. In the international debate surrounding the topic of euthanasia, he is one of its most well-known and controversial proponents.
It wouldn’t be a stretch to call Nitschke, who has been nicknamed “Dr. Death,” a “euthanasia guru.” He’s the founder of Exit International, an organization that promotes voluntary euthanasia. He also wrote the suicide handbook The Peaceful Pill. Initially, he only spoke out about euthanasia for the terminally ill, but he’s since changed his mind: He now believes that euthanasia shouldn’t be confined by conditions and criteria, but instead is something that each person has the right to choose. In recent years, he’s spent a lot of time designing Sarco, a 3D-printable suicide machine, which—according to him—will allow people to die peacefully. Due to this new invention, the past few weeks both Nitschke and his ideas have once again received a lot of attention. We talked to Philip about euthanasia as a human right, his own death, and his latest invention: The Sarco.