2024-07-03 10:00:56
A Dutch couple in their 70s who had been married for 50 years ended their lives through mutual euthanasia.
According to the BBC and other sources on the 29th of last month (local time), Dutch couple Jan Faber (70) and Els van Rieningen (71) died together after being administered euthanasia drugs by a doctor on the 3rd of last month.
Jan and Els met in kindergarten, married in their 20s and had a son. Jan played hockey for the Dutch youth national team as a child and became a sports coach. Els worked as a primary school teacher.
They were interested in the sea and spent most of their married life on boats, even buying a cargo ship and starting a freight transport company.
However, Jan, who had been moving cargo for over 10 years, had back pain and underwent surgery in 2003, but did not recover easily. Els also showed early symptoms of dementia after retiring from teaching in 2018 and was diagnosed with dementia in November 2022.
The two, who were suffering, are said to have discussed mutual euthanasia before their condition worsened. Jan said before he died, “If I took a lot of medicine, I would have to live like a zombie,” and “When I thought about the pain I was going through and my wife’s illness (dementia), I thought this had to stop.”
The couple’s children hoped that “better times would come when the disease could be cured,” but Jan and Els concluded that there was no other solution and decided on euthanasia.
The Netherlands was the first country in the world to legalize euthanasia in 2002. Euthanasia can be performed when the following criteria are met: △ if the individual voluntarily requests it; △ if the requester’s physical or psychological pain is assessed by a doctor as being “unbearable”; and △ if there is no prospect of improvement.
There are still not many countries that allow euthanasia. On the one hand, people are demanding that “unbearable suffering be stopped with the help of doctors,” while on the other hand, people are raising their voices about the side effects of euthanasia and the ethics of life.
In Korea, meaningless life-sustaining treatment can be stopped at the patient’s request, but active euthanasia through drug administration or prescription is still illegal. Late last year, a terminally ill patient demanded the legalization of assisted death, sparking another fierce debate on euthanasia.
Reporter Choi Jae-ho, Donga.com [email protected]
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2024-07-03 10:00:56