Dutch euthanasia centre sees 22% rise in requests in 2019
TVNZ One News 8 February 2020
Family First Comment: “The number of people with dementia who received euthanasia rose from 70 in 2018 to 96 last year, the Euthanasia Expertise Center said. Two of those cases involved patients with dementia so advanced they were considered mentally incapacitated.”
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Protect.org.nz
A Dutch organisation that carries out euthanasia received 3122 requests last year, a 22 per cent increase from the year before, the Euthanasia Expertise Center said today.
“Every work day, 13 people say: ‘Help me, I can’t go on,'” Steven Pleiter, director of the centre formerly known as the End of Life Clinic, said.
The centre has experts who advise general practitioners in euthanasia cases and teams made up of doctors, psychiatrists and nurses who visit patients to evaluate their requests and administer fatal doses of drugs if they meet euthanasia criteria.
The Netherlands in 2002 became the first country in the world to legalise euthanasia. It can only be performed by physicians who administer fatal drug doses under strict conditions.
The centre said it honored nearly 900, or about one-third, of the requests it received in 2019.
The requests often were in cases of people with dementia or suffering multiple physical complaints linked to old age.
READ MORE: https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/world/dutch-euthanasia-centre-sees-22-rise-in-requests-2019
