Euthanasia is generally legal in Switzerland, with the only laws prohibiting assisted suicide being those performed with "selfish motives". In the year 2014, a total of 752 assisted suicides, compared to 1,029 non-assisted suicides ; most of the assisted suicides concerned elderly people suffering from a terminal disease. Euthanasia organisations have been widely used by foreigners, in what critics have termed suicide tourism. As of 2008, 60% of the total number of suicides assisted by the organisation Dignitas had been Germans.
Legal situation
The Swiss Criminal Code of 1937 outlaws "incitement or assistance to suicide from selfish motives". Any active role in voluntary euthanasia is also outlawed, even if committed from "respectable motives" such as mercy killings. However, by omission, assisted suicide from non-selfish motives remains legal. For example, lethal drugs may be prescribed as long as the recipient takes an active role in the drug administration, but active euthanasia is not legal. All forms of active euthanasia like administering lethal injection remain prohibited in Switzerland. Swiss law only allows providing means to commit suicide, and reasons for doing so must not be based on self-interest. Based on this legal situation, non-profit organisations administering life-ending medicine were first established in Switzerland in the 1980s. Article 115 of the Swiss Criminal Code reads: The Swiss Criminal Code states that "English is not an official language of the Swiss Confederation. This translation is provided for information purposes only and has no legal force." This regulation of assisted suicide also permits the assistance of voluntary euthanasia for non-resident foreigners, which has led to the phenomenon of "suicide tourism". When an assisted suicide is declared, a police inquiry may be started. Since no crime has been committed in the absence of a selfish motive, these are mostly open and shut cases. Prosecution can occur if doubts are raised about the patient's competence to make an autonomous choice, or about the motivation of anyone involved in assisting the suicide. While there is no regulation on permissible reasons for the suicide, the major Swiss non-profit organisations dedicated to assisted suicide may require that a terminal illness has been diagnosed.
Debate
A complaint against the health department of the canton of Zurich on the part of a man suffering from bipolar affective disorder and desiring to be issued with pentobarbital by the state in order to end his life was rejected in a Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland decision of 3 November 2006. The court conceded that "It cannot be denied that an incurable, long-lasting, severe mental impairment similar to a somatic one can create a suffering out of which a patient would find his/her life in the long run not worth living anymore" but found that no case can be made that the state has any obligation to facilitate the availability of substances used for euthanasia, as had been argued by the plaintiff based on both the Swiss Federal Constitution and on article 8 of the ECHR. In a referendum on 15 May 2011, voters in the canton of Zurich overwhelmingly rejected calls to ban assisted suicide or to outlaw the practice for non-residents. Out of more than 278,000 ballots cast, the initiative to ban assisted suicide was rejected by 85 per cent of voters and the initiative to outlaw it for foreigners was turned down by 78 per cent. In a 2007 essay in the Hastings Center Report, bioethicist Jacob M. Appel advocated adopting similar rules in the United States.
