PARIS, July 25, 2001 (LSN.ca) – French Health Minister, Bernard Kouchner, has admitted he committed euthanasia when he worked as a doctor. In an interview with the Dutch weekly magazine Vrij Nederland, Mr Kouchner said that during the wars in Lebanon and Vietnam he “helped” people die with morphine injections when he believed they were suffering too much. “When people were suffering too much pain and I knew in advance they would die, I would help them,” he said.
According to a BBC report, Kouchner – UN administrator for Kosovo in the late 1990s – does not currently plan to introduce pro-euthanasia legislation in France, but said passive euthanasia, where doctors suspend treatment of dying patients, occurs frequently in France. His arguments on the subject mirror those of abortion advocates who refer to abortion as a necessary evil. “Euthanasia contradicts medical ethics,” said Kouchner. “Doctors exist to protect life, not to end it. But if someone says he wants to die, society has to take that into account.”
See the BBC coverage at: https://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_1455000/1455521.stm