Legal Challenges to Restrictions on Assistance in Suicide in Italy, Germany and Austria: An Ethico-Legal Analysis

Abstract

Abstract This paper deals with a series of legal cases in Italy, Germany, and Austria, between September 2019 and December 2020, which ruled that laws prohibiting or restricting assistance in suicide were unconstitutional. There are similarities between these three cases, all of which are influenced by the practice of assisted suicide in Switzerland, but also differences, not least because of the antecedent legal contexts. Each case is based on flawed reasoning. They have in common an exaggerated account of autonomy or self-determination, insufficiently qualified by the duty to protect human life or by other ethical constraints. The Italian and Austrian Courts also appeal to the principle of equality and to a supposed analogy with refusal of life-sustaining treatments, both of which raise concerns in relation to further expansion of the provisions. In responding to these flawed judgements, legislators should favour proposals that prevent the normalisation of assisted and non-assisted suicide.