Former palliative care nurse dies at euthanasia clinic

A healthy retired nurse has ended her life at a Swiss suicide clinic because she did not want to become old.

Last week, 75-year-old Gill Pharaoh travelled from London, England, to Basel, Switzerland, where she chose to die by assisted suicide at a clinic, the London Times reports.

A spokesman for Care Not Killing, which campaigns against assisted dying, said of Ms Pharaoh’s death: “This is another deeply troubling case and sends out a chilling message about how society values and looks after elderly people in the UK”.

But her partner John Southall told the BBC that her quality of life had deteriorated and she lived in fear of having a stroke. All three supported Ms Pharaoh in her decision, although they did not agree with it. Caron in particular is said to have found it particularly hard emotionally. I have to take action early on because no one will be able to take action for me.

She said her children knew of her plan and admitted that they struggled to accept her decision.

John said: “The whole evening was very tranquil and enjoyable”.

The mother-of-two explained that she did not want to become an “old lady blocking beds in a hospital ward”.

Months before her death, Pharaoh wrote a blog post titled “My Last Word” where she revealed she was finally ready to die.

He said: “She (Black) made no secret of her desire not to linger in her old age and that is a bit like how Gill Pharaoh felt – she had had a good life, was active, had two wonderful children”.

“Not to mention the hundred and one other minor irritations like being unable to stand for long, carry a heavy shopping bag, run for a bus, remember the names of books I have read, or am reading, or their authors”, she wrote.

“I’ve gone just over the hill now. If you knew Gill there would be no persuading her. She was not a girl to be persuaded”.

‘I have had to do this outside my home, and without telling too many people for the same reason.

“If I could have booked my death quite openly, I could have had a party before I died, in the way that people have done, and continue to do, in Switzerland and other places”. Pharaoh told the paper “it is not his choice at all and my kids are backing me, although it is not their choice“.

Life has so much more to offer even in the midst of difficulties than those who are advocating assisted suicide would have us believe.

She added: “In a nursing home you have people who are incontinent, who use bad language, who walk around the rooms and just take things”. We do not look at the reality.

Before she died on July 21, Gill arranged her own humanist memorial service for later this month.

The number of “suicide tourists” visiting Swiss clinics doubled between 2008 and 2012, a period when 611 people from 31 countries ended their lives in the mountain country, according to a recent study.