July 30, 2015
Jay Franklin is pleading for help to end his life peacefully
In 2012, after nearly 100 operations and suffering ongoing chronic pain and depression from 35 years of living with a congenital bowel disease, Jay Franklin decided he would seek to end his life
Jay Franklin has a ticket to die. Two years ago, the 37-year-old became one of the few Australians to be accepted at Swiss euthanasia clinic, Dignitas, for an assisted death.
It was a significant decision by Dignitas because Mr Franklin is not dying of a terminal illness.
He is, however, battling a painful congenital bowel condition .
This rare, lifelong battle with Hirschsprung’s disease has involved more than 100 operations and left him without a large bowel and less than a quarter of the intestines he was born with.
In 2013, a Dignitas doctor decided that Mr Franklin’s constant abdominal pain, difficulty eating and constant struggle to live a productive life meant he qualified for an assisted death.
To get to the clinic, Mr Franklin raised thousands of dollars from sympathetic supporters to cover his expenses.
But this week, the Melbourne man says he no longer wants to make the difficult journey to Europe to die. He wants to do that at home instead.
Taking another step in his extraordinary journey, Mr Franklin has made a video pleading for someone in Australia to give him the drug Nembutal – the so-called “peaceful pill” promoted by pro-euthanasia groups.
The drug is not available on prescription in Australia, although an increasing number of people have illegally sourced it and taken their own lives with it in this country over the last decade.
In Mr Franklin’s video, the launch of which has been timed to coincide with a Victorian parliamentary inquiry into end-of-life choices, he tells of his chronic pain, which he is unable always to relieve with powerful opioid drugs.
“I’m on a lot of heavy narcotics to try to help my pain, but these aren’t completely successful,” he says.
“I’ve been told on many occasions that there is nothing surgically they [my doctors] can offer me … all they can do is try to manage my pain the best they can at home.
“And because they don’t class my situation as terminal, there is no help I can receive from palliative care services here in Victoria.”
Mr Franklin said his health had deteriorated over the past 18 months, causing him to have intravenous pain killers in hospital every six weeks. He has also been unable to eat much, so has been getting fed intravenously through a drip four nights a week. Despite all of this, he said he was not depressed.
In a statement released by Philip Nitschke’s voluntary euthanasia group, Exit International, about the video, Mr Franklin says he has returned the money raised for his Switzerland trip.
“I cannot travel to Switzerland because my health has declined so much,” he said.
In the video, he says: “I don’t feel I should travel to the other side of the world to end my life and wish I could do this in my own home, at the time of my choosing.
“It doesn’t look like voluntary euthanasia laws will be changed in Australia in the near future after a lot of attempts that have to date failed to be passed in different states.
“If there is anyone out there who could give me, or sell me, a bottle of Nembutal so I can end my life in a peaceful, dignified manner, this would be gratefully appreciated.”
In his written statement, Mr Franklin says if the Victorian government agreed to legalise voluntary euthanasia, sourcing a drug illegally in this fashion would become unnecessary for people with a terminal illness. But he still suspects people like him – people without a terminal illness – would not be served by any new law.
In 2012, Mr Franklin told The Age that he would like his loved ones, including his supportive mother Bertha, to be with him when he dies. But he fears they could be charged with assisting a suicide if they are.
In Victoria, this offence carries a maximum jail term of five years.
“We don’t have any say about coming into this world, so I feel like we should have the right to a peaceful, comfortable and humane death without doing something drastic,” he said.
Mrs Franklin said at the time of the interview that, although heartbreaking, she understood her son’s wish to die. She had watched his quality of life deteriorate for many years, she said.
“I feel honoured that he’s had the courage to confide in me and has not tried to hide this,” she said.
“Of course it will be a dreadful thing but it’s too hard for him now, it’s just too hard.”