Advocate defends advice on death pill

Philip Nitschke, euthanasia advocate for Exit International. Photo / Dean Purcell

An Australian euthanasia organisation that offers advice on obtaining the illegal drug Nembutal from overseas defended itself yesterday following revelations that 14 people under 40 have died in the past decade after taking the barbiturate.

The figures were released by the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, which found that 51 people in total had died of the drug between July 2000 and November 2009.

Nembutal is banned in Australia, except in veterinary medicine. Exit International, run by Philip Nitschke, a long-standing euthanasia advocate, provides instructions on how to buy it from Mexico.

Nitschke said yesterday that Exit had given occasional advice to people in their 20s and 30s who were in chronic pain or terminally ill.

"The idea that you can't possibly decide to end your life before the age of 50 because you might not fit those criteria is untrue," he said.

Exit runs seminars about Nembutal and has published a booklet, The Peaceful Pill Handbook, which can be downloaded from the internet, although it is illegal to do so in Australia.

The institute's report, quoted in the Age newspaper, said the figures did not cover all the Nembutal-related deaths, only those identified from its national database.

Of the 51 deceased, it said, six were in their 20s, eight in their 30s, five in their 40s, 14 in their 50s, three in their 60s, 10 in their 70s, three in their 80s and two in their 90s.

In 11 out of 38 cases examined by a coroner, the person had suffered from chronic pain, deteriorating health or significant physical illness. In the rest, no reference was made to those factors.

In 10 cases, euthanasia-related material was found at the scene, or the person had contacted a euthanasia organisation.

A 61-year-old Melbourne woman, Ann Leith, was charged this month with importing Nembutal. Nitschke said Leith was in remission from breast cancer and wanted the drug for personal use.

He told the Age that Exit was seeing increasing numbers of people who were just "tired of life".

He said the risk that people with mental illnesses might use Nembutal to commit suicide had to be balanced against "the growing pool of older people who feel immense well-being from having access to this information".

Deadly drug

* Pentobarbital, commonly known as Nembutal, is a barbiturate that slows the activity of the brain and nervous system.

* It is used by vets to euthanase animals and for legal euthanasia in Europe and the United States.

* It is sold in Mexican pet shops.

* It was once prescribed as a sleeping pill for humans, but was taken off the market in Australia in 1998.

* It was the drug used by Dr Philip Nitschke to help four people die in the Northern Territory under the world's first euthanasia laws in 1997. The laws were overturned.

* Importing Nembutal into Australia carries a maximum penalty of 25 years' imprisonment or a A$550,000 ($700,000) fine.
(AAP)