A 44-year-old quadriplegic man has been given the green light by a regional Italian health authority to become the second person offered assisted suicide in the country.
The man, Antonio, who has been a quadriplegic since 2014, was given permission to be administered a drug for assisted suicide by the regional health authority in the Marche region.
According to Antonio, he was about to try and make contact with a Swiss facility to perform the procedure before he received notice of the health authority’s decision, saying he was happy he could be euthanised in his home country, Il Giornale reports.
The man was aided by the Associazione Luca Coscioni, a group that has played a leading role in advocating for assisted suicide for Italians.
“Now Antonio is finally free to choose if and when to proceed,” Filomena Gallo, who serves both as Antonio’s lawyer and as president of the Associazione Luca Coscioni, said,
“But it took almost two years for this right to be respected. A very long time for people who are in conditions of extreme suffering and who, unfortunately, many sick people do not have.”
In Italy, assisted suicide, or euthanasia, must meet four conditions, including an independently formed intention. The person must have an incurable illness while being kept alive by life-supporting treatments, must consider they have insufferable mental or physical pain, and must be able to make free and informed decisions.
The move by the regional health authority comes just months after Italy’s first euthanization in June, when Federico Carboni, also 44, became the first person killed by assisted suicide. Carboni had also been a quadriplegic for 11 years due to a car accident.
Italy currently has no formal law granting the right to euthanasia, however, and the Roman Catholic Church in Italy has always been fiercely opposed to the notion, with Pope Francis stating his view in February.
“We must accompany people towards death, but not provoke death or facilitate any form of suicide,” the Pope said.
“Life is a right, not death, which must be welcomed, not administered,” he explained.