Suicide Pod Usage Leads To Multiple Arrests
Swiss police announced the arrests of several people after responding to a call made by an attorney’s office that informed the authorities that a woman had used a suicide pod to end her life. Schaffhausen police told the media that they made the arrests on suspicion that the “several individuals” involved had unlawfully incited, aided, and abetted the act. Switzerland is one of only a handful of nations where assisted suicide is legal but is strictly regulated in ways that have brought the suicide pod under intense legal scrutiny.
Body Was Found Still Inside The Pod
Police maintain that they found a Sarco suicide pod in the Merishausen region near the country’s border with Germany. It was located inside a small hut with the body of the deceased woman still inside it. Neither her identity nor the identity of the individuals arrested has been released by Swiss police.
A US Woman
The police also revealed that their tip came from a law office. While it’s not clear if the attorneys involved had direct connections to the deceased, it is known that the woman whose body was discovered inside the suicide pod was a woman from the United States.
It’s common for foreign travelers who are unable to legally obtain access to assisted suicide to travel to Switzerland. With the invention of the Sarco suicide pod, it’s reasonable to expect that there could well be more travel to the country for that purpose, depending on the outcome of these recent arrests.
A Major Controversy
The already controversial “right to die” movement has become even more contentious with the advent of the Sarco (short for “sarcophagus“) suicide pod. The device was created by euthanasia advocate Philip Nitschke seven years ago, who maintains that his pod gives those choosing to end their lives a humane way in which to do it. He built the concept by piggybacking off of the suicide bag, which fits over the head and suffocates the wearer by using inert gases to cut off the brain’s oxygen supply.
How It Works
Sarco’s suicide pod works by rapidly decreasing the oxygen level inside the device while maintaining the same low level of carbon dioxide. When the pod is activated by the user, more than a gallon of liquid nitrogen is triggered and forces the levels of oxygen in the chamber to plummet to under 5 percent in less than 60 seconds. The lack of oxygen and increased levels of nitrogen cause dizziness in the user, who quickly loses consciousness and then dies.
The Last Resort
The Sarco suicide pod has strong advocates in The Last Resort, a right-to-die group that showed off the device in Zurich over the summer. The organization maintained that they saw zero obstacles under current Swiss law with the company’s pod and promoted its usage.
It’s known that The Last Resort’s co-president, Florian Willet, was the only person to attend the unnamed woman’s suicide. The activist claims that the woman died in a manner that was “peaceful, fast, and dignified,” taking place in “open air under a canopy of trees.”
One option that Sarco suicide pod owners have is choosing between one that is fully enclosed or one that has a clear window so that they can die while viewing their chosen environment.
Sources: BBC
