Dying for change

Sean Davison is already well known for his involvement in four assisted suicides. But there have been others, too, he tells CHRIS COOKE, as he prepares to take on a new role that will again thrust him into the international spotlight.

- CHRIS COOKE

Sean Davison never imagined that one day he'd be helping numerous people end their lives. Born in Auckland, raised in Hokitika, and educated in both New Zealand and South Africa, he hadn't expected that's where his PhD in microbiology might take him. But circumstances intervened.

Davison shot to public prominence in 2010 when police decided to prosecute him for helping his terminally ill mother to die. But the full extent of his own journey through an ethical minefield, and how his views about euthanasia have evolved since then, have remained hidden until now.

He is now convinced it is not just people suffering from physical pain, but also those in mental pain, who should have access to assisted dying. Our brains, he believes, do not differentiate between the two.

"I support the fundamental belief that a person has a right to determine their own death at their own time if they're over 18 and have a rational mind," he explains. "No one has the right to say another person can't end their life; to say, 'No, you're not suffering enough. It's an individual's choice." 

He reveals that among the people he's helped to die was a 21-year-old suffering from depression and having persistent thoughts of committing violent sexual crimes. The young man was distraught after years of treatment hadn't worked, and his parents supported his decision to end his life. They were present when he died.

Unlike most psychiatrists, Davison believes that people who are mentally unwell can still make rational decisions. "I think no one should judge someone who's answering the pleas of a loved one begging for assistance to die, until they have put themselves in the same position and asked: 'What would I do?' I believe any humane person would want to help."

He would like to see more liberal laws allowing assisted death, along the lines of what is already available in countries like Belgium and Switzerland.