14 DAY TRIAL // The superior and inferior chambers of the German parliament are currently struggling to find a common ground on the ethical and moral implications that assisted suicides have on the nation. This phenomenon, which is totally legal in Switzerland, has also caught roots in Germany, and government officials, as well as church leaders, didn't take too kindly of its main proponent, Roger Kusch, a former Hamburg Justice Minister.
This year alone, Kusch counseled five people on how to come to terms with the fact that they want to take their own lives, charging them some 8,000 euros (10,110 dollars) per case for his trouble. He advertised his services as a "suicide counselor," which won him the criticism of the entire Catholic Church, which says suicide is not acceptable under any conditions.
The euthanasia advocate doesn't even partake in the actual suicide, because that would be illegal under the German law. Instead, he talks to people before and during their suicide ritual, giving them advice on what and how to do it until the last moment. "I provide a service. It's of value, and in our society such things do not come free," the man says.
The case of Frieda Felger was the one that brought this matter to the public opinion. The woman was 97 years-old and she took her own life because of loneliness and her medical conditions. She took a powerful cocktail of drugs and swallowed them all at once, ending her life in a cheap hotel room. Kusch said that she would have preferred to die at home, but that the police, who had previously ransacked the counselor's house, could have tried to stop her.
Germany currently struggles to bring its number of suicides under control, especially among its seniors, around 60 years-old. Official estimates place the number of suicides among old people at about 4,000 each year, which accounts for more than 40 percent of all cases, although this population group only represents a quarter of all German people.