A gas chamber device designed to enable people to kill themselves quickly is due to be used for the first time this month, according to Swiss media reports.
The capsule-like technology – called the ‘Sarco Pod’, ‘Sarco’ being short for sarcophagus – is designed for a person to enter and press a button that will reportedly kill them within seconds.
The pod fills with nitrogen which results in a rapid decrease in oxygen, rendering the user unconscious before they’re killed.
Exit International’s ‘Sarco’ webpage says that the pod creates the conditions for a “peaceful, even euphoric death” and that its design was intended to suggest “a sense of occasion: of travel to a ‘new destination’”.
It was designed by controversial euthanasia advocate Philip Nitschke, often referred to by the media as ‘Dr Death’, who late last year appeared before the Oireachtas Committee on Assisted Dying to give expert testimony.
Nitschke was presented at the committee as a doctor, and was referred to as a member of the medical profession by a committee member.
However, Nitschke’s ‘Dr’ title is related to a PhD in physics, not having practised medicine for years.
He told the committee November 28 that he was asked to comment on the Australian experience of assisted suicide and euthanasia. He did not explain the details of the 2014 cancellation of his licence by the Medical Board of Australia (MBA), which met to discuss allegations that he had advised a 45 year old man suffering from depression, but who was otherwise healthy, to end his life.
The MBA ultimately said that it would reinstate Nitschke’s medical licence if he agreed to end his work with Exit International and agreed to never offer counsel on euthanasia again.
He chose instead to burn his medical registration cert and leave Australia and to continue his work with the group from Europe.
Pro-life groups have warned that the suicide pod ‘trivialises’ and even ‘glamourises suicide’.
Exit Switzerland’s website displays an image of the pod with the words ‘coming soon’.
Swiss news outlet NZZ reported that Nitschke wrote in an online forum June 10 that the gas chamber’s implementation in Switzerland was expected “in the next few weeks”.
Well-informed sources told the outlet that Exit Switzerland’s preparations are almost complete, with the launch scheduled for July.
The sources claimed that the person seeking assisted suicide, who has been selected for the device’s first use, has already travelled to Switzerland.
Assisted suicide is legal in Switzerland, where hundreds of people engage with organisations such as Dignitas and Exit (a separate group to Nitschke’s) annually.