French Health Minister, Dr. Bernard Kouchner, Admits Mercy Killings
Articles & Reports
British Broadcasting Corporation - French Health Minister Admits Mercy Killings
Link to the BBC article and web pages on Bernard Kouchner and euthanasia
Hear the BBC's Geraldine Coughlan's Real Audio report ( 28k) - Bernard Kouchner says he has no intention of trying to introduce legislation"
Reuters English News Service - Netherlands: French Health Minister Admits Mercy Killings
French Health Minister Admits Mercy Killings
BRITISH BROADCASTING CORP - Tuesday, 24 July, 2001
French Health Minister Bernard Kouchner's remarks are expected to spark a debate. The French Health Minister, Bernard Kouchner, has admitted he practised euthanasia when he worked as a doctor.
In an interview with the Dutch weekly magazine Vrij Nederland, Mr Kouchner said he practised mercy killings during the wars in Lebanon and Vietnam, injecting people who he said were suffering too much.
When people were suffering too much pain and I knew in advance they would die, I would help them.
Mr Kouchner - a founding member of the Paris-based medical aid agency, Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF) - said passive euthanasia, where doctors suspend treatment of dying patients, occurs frequently in France.
The Netherlands will become the first country in the world to legalise euthanasia when a new law allowing mercy killing comes into effect this autumn.
Dutch doctors help around 4,000 patients to die each year, but they still face prosecution if they do not follow strict guidelines.
BBC correspondent Geraldine Coughlan says Mr Kouchner's remarks are expected to spark a debate in other countries on euthanasia.
Mr Kouchner said he had helped various people to die during his career, injecting with morphine rather than administering pills.
Netherlands parliament passing law The Netherlands have already passed a euthanasia law
"When people were suffering too much pain and I knew in advance they would die, I would help them," he said.
But euthanasia is a sensitive issue in France, and Mr Kouchner says he has no intention of introducing legislation to allow it.
He said if there is to be discussion on any changes to the practice it will focus on protecting the patient.
"Euthanasia contradicts medical ethics," he said. "Doctors exist to protect life, not to end it. But if someone says he wants to die, society has to take that into account."
Mr Kouchner has a reputation as an outspoken critic of human rights abuses throughout the world.
NETHERLANDS: French Health Minister admits to mercy killings
REUTERS ENGLISH NEWS SERVICE (July 24, 2001)
By Paul Gallagher
AMSTERDAM, July 24 (Reuters) - France's health minister Bernard Kouchner has said he performed mercy killings in Vietnam and Lebanon during a controversial career as a doctor and aid worker, but said ending someone's life was a "delicate matter".
Kouchner, co-founder of the medical aid charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) and a supporter of legalising euthanasia, made the revelation to a Dutch magazine.
"I have performed euthanasia various times. When people were suffering too much pain and I knew in advance they would die, I would help them. I did that in Lebanon and I did that in Vietnam," the 61-year-old told the weekly Vrij Nederland.
"If you switch off the treatment machine, the patient dies and I can tell you, it works.
"I gave people injections, never tablets. Injections with a lot of morphine. Some people I can still remember very well. All doctors in the world know those sorts of patients," he said.
The interview was made available on Tuesday, a day ahead of publication. Kouchner's office said the interview was accurate.
Energetic and outspoken, Kouchner rose to prominence by spearheading humanitarian missions over two decades.
In April, when the Netherlands became the first country to openly endorse euthanasia , he said he would press for it to be legalised in France too.
Kouchner returned to French government in February after a stint as U.N. administrator in Kosovo. He first moved into mainstream politics in the 1980's, holding several cabinet posts, and became something of a celebrity in France.
He was behind the group of French doctors and aid workers who from the late 1960's broke the rules of diplomatic etiquette by taking relief to war victims without first asking permission.
He has done relief work in Biafra, Jordan, Kurdistan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Armenia and Yugoslavia.
"I have been in so many wars and also in hospitals. It happens on a daily basis that life-prolonging (medical) equipment is being switched off," he said in the interview.
Asked what form of euthanasia he had administered, he replied: "Both passive and active euthanasia ."
"When push comes to shove nobody wants to die. I have seen patients who struggled to their last sob."