HIGHEST COURT REVERSES BAN ON ASSISTED SUICIDE

GERMANY

BERLIN Assisted suicide was fully legalized in Germany Wednesday after its highest court overturned a previous ban.

Doctors and organizations offering assisted suicide to patients previously faced up to three years in prison.

But the German constitutional court ruled that infringed the right of an individual to choose to die.

“We may regret his decision, but we must ultimately accept his free decision,” said Andreas Vosskuhle, the president of the court.

The decision only allows doctors to prescribe patients drugs to help them die, but the patients must take the drugs themselves.

Under the previous legal situation anyone deemed to offer assisted suicide on a regular basis faced prosecution, relatives or doctors who helped a single patient to die on a one-off basis were exempt from criminal charges.