Gauthier Saskia, Mausbach Julian, Reisch Thomas, Bartsch Christine
Institute of Legal Medicine, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
Centre for Medicine-Ethics-Swiss Law, Institute of Jurisprudence, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
J Med Ethics. 2015 Aug;41(8):611-7. doi: 10.1136/medethics-2014-102091. Epub 2014 Aug 20.
While assisted suicide (AS) is strictly restricted in many countries, it is not clearly regulated by law in Switzerland. This imbalance leads to an influx of people-'suicide tourists'-coming to Switzerland, mainly to the Canton of Zurich, for the sole purpose of committing suicide. Political debate regarding 'suicide tourism' is taking place in many countries. Swiss medicolegal experts are confronted with these cases almost daily, which prompted our scientific investigation of the phenomenon. The present study has three aims: (1) to determine selected details about AS in the study group (age, gender and country of residence of the suicide tourists, the organisation involved, the ingested substance leading to death and any diseases that were the main reason for AS); (2) to find out the countries from which suicide tourists come and to review existing laws in the top three in order to test the hypothesis that suicide tourism leads to the amendment of existing regulations in foreign countries; and (3) to compare our results with those of earlier studies in Zurich. We did a retrospective data analysis of the Zurich Institute of Legal Medicine database on AS of non-Swiss residents in the last 5 years (2008-2012), and internet research for current legislation and political debate in the three foreign countries most concerned. We analysed 611 cases from 31 countries all over the world. Non-terminal conditions such as neurological and rheumatic diseases are increasing among suicide tourists. The unique phenomenon of suicide tourism in Switzerland may indeed result in the amendment or supplementary guidelines to existing regulations in foreign countries.
虽然在许多国家协助自杀受到严格限制，但在瑞士却没有明确的法律规定。这种不平衡导致了“自杀游客”涌入瑞士，主要是苏黎世州，他们的唯一目的就是自杀。许多国家都在进行关于“自杀旅游”的政治辩论。瑞士法医学专家几乎每天都会面对这些案例，这促使我们对这一现象进行科学调查。本研究有三个目的：（1）确定研究组中协助自杀的选定细节（自杀游客的年龄、性别和居住国、涉及的组织、导致死亡的摄入物质以及作为协助自杀主要原因的任何疾病）；（2）找出自杀游客来自哪些国家，并审查排名前三的国家的现行法律，以检验自杀旅游会导致外国现行法规修订的假设；（3）将我们的结果与苏黎世早期研究的结果进行比较。我们对苏黎世法医学研究所过去5年（2008 - 2012年）非瑞士居民协助自杀的数据库进行了回顾性数据分析，并对三个最相关的外国的现行立法和政治辩论进行了网络研究。我们分析了来自世界31个国家的611个案例。自杀游客中神经和风湿性疾病等非终末期疾病正在增加。瑞士独特的自杀旅游现象可能确实会导致外国对现行法规进行修订或补充指导方针。
