Brittany Maynard, the 29-year-old who chose to die
29-year-old Brittany Maynard is not the first person to announce in a video her decision to die to end the suffering of a terminal illness, but her message is having an unusual impact on the United States, where the euthanasia debate has been revived.
In just six days, the us company's video has received more than 6,300,000 views on the YouTube portal.
Sitting in front of the camera Maynard explains that she learned she had a type of brain cancer without a cure in January, shortly after her wedding.
"Just when I was diagnosed, my husband and I were actively looking to expand the family. It was very painful."
In his video, produced by proeutanasia organization Compassion & Choices, Maynard pulls out of his purse two cans of pills that he says he will take to die, in his bedroom with his loved ones, while music of his choice plays.
Maynard chose November 1 as the date of her death, two days after her husband's birthday, Dan Diaz.
She and her husband moved from California to Oregon, one of five states in the U.S. where doctor-assisted suicide is allowed. Once he established his residence there and proved that he had less than six months to live, he obtained the medicines to die.
Maynard has made the video in the hope that others who don't have the same resources to move to other U.S. states will have the same choice.
"I can't even tell you how much relief I feel from knowing that I don't have to die the way I've been described as I would do as a result of my brain tumor," Maynard says.
In 1997, Oregon became the first U.S. state to legalize the "right to die worthily."
Terminal patients in full use of reason can request assisted death from a doctor.
The patient should swallow the pill unaided. It's illegal for the doctor to administer it.
More than 750 people in Oregon have used the "right to die worthily" until December 31, 2013. The average age of applicants is 71 years. Only six were under the age of 34, like Maynard.
Maynard's story has reopened the U.S. debate about the morality of assisted suicide.
"These nearly six million views (to the video on YoutTube) are going to translate tomorrow into advocates of the right to die worthily," says Mickey MacIntyre of Compassion & Choices, in an interview with BBC Mundo.
According to MacIntyre, there have been others who expressed a desire to die worthily in other campaigns but none with such resonance.
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