Published Jan. 13, 2003 SUIC14
By Michelle Morgante, Associated Press
SAN DIEGO -- A doctor whose prototype suicide machine was seized as he left
his native Australia to attend a euthanasia conference says his U.S.
supporters will help him rebuild the device.
Dr. Philip Nitschke said that Australian customs agents
in Sydney seized his COGen machine Thursday. He had planned to unveil the
device, which lets people kill themselves with carbon monoxide, before a
national meeting of the Hemlock Society in San Diego.
``They were waiting for me. It's clear,'' he said. ``We'd been quite public
about bringing the machine to the U.S. to demonstrate it.''
Nitschke, 55, told conference participants Sunday that he intends to
challenge the Australian law banning the exportation of any instrument that
could be used to assist in suicide. He said another suicide machine would be
built in the United States. Because his invention can be operated
single-handedly, it does not break U.S. laws barring assisted suicide,
Nitschke said. It consists of a coffee-can-sized canister, an intravenous
drip bag and nasal prongs. Chemicals are combined in the canister to produce
carbon monoxide, which is then inhaled.
Although it has not been tested, Nitschke estimated it would render a person
unconscious within minutes and cause death in 30 minutes to an hour. More
than $11,000 was spent to develop the patented device, but Nitschke said he
hoped to make it available for free to pro-euthanasia groups.
``It has all the essential elements of being simple, transportable and the
patients use it themselves,'' said Hemlock Society founder Derek Humphry.
’`This type of machine cuts out the legal risk.''
American euthanasia advocate Dr. Jack Kevorkian, who is serving a 10- to
25-year prison sentence for the 1998 death by injection of a Lou Gehrig's
disease patient, also used a device that employed carbon monoxide.
Kevorkian's machine relied on a compressed version of the toxic gas, which
is hard to obtain and transport. Nitschke said his machine produces carbon
monoxide itself.
An earlier system Nitschke developed featured a syringe that administered a
lethal injection at the push of a button on a laptop computer. It was used
by four terminally ill people between July 1996 and March 1997, when a
short-lived law permitted voluntary euthanasia in Australia's Northern
Territory.
Nitschke's appearance drew protests from the California Life Coalition,
which called his invention ghoulish.
``Instead of helping people overcome their problems, he can only help to
murder them,'' coalition director Cheryl Sullenger said in a statement.
But Nitschke said he was providing a humane alternative. He predicted that
as the Baby Boom generation ages, more people will want to control how and
when they die.
``It's pretty ghoulish when people shoot themselves with shotguns and hang
themselves,'' he said.
Produced by the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, Box 25033, London ON N6C 6A8
Tel: 1-877-439-3348, Email: info@epcc.ca