An assisted dying clinic in Switzerland has helped a British woman to end her life without informing her family, despite reportedly claiming to have changed its practices after a similar incident in 2023.
Anne Canning, 51, from Wales, travelled to the Pegasos clinic near the Swiss city of Basel in January to end her life.
She chose to do so after the death of her son plunged her into depression, according to her sister Delia, who told ITV News that Anne had no terminal illness and had assured her family she was travelling to Switzerland for a holiday.
The family were completely unaware of Anne’s true intentions until a bundle of letters arrived at their doorstep.
The letters, posted from Switzerland but not directly from the address of the Pegasos clinic, read: ‘If you’re reading this, I am no longer here. I have thought about this long and hard and need to find [my son] and ask him some questions.
‘There is nothing you could have done, because this was my decision to go to Switzerland and be in peace.’
This horrific surprise, revealed in an ITV News investigation, came after Pegasos clinic had reportedly changed their policy to contact family members of every patient who decides to end their life at their clinic before carrying out the lethal injection.
In 2023, chemistry teacher Alastair Hamilton, 47, told his parents he was visiting a friend in Paris but secretly flew to Switzerland to end his life at the Pegasos clinic.
After the distraught family filed a missing persons report with no word of their son’s whereabouts, the Metropolitan Police, the Foreign Office and Interpol eventually discovered Alastair had died with the help of Pegasos.
In emails to Alastair’s family, a frustrated Met Police sergeant criticised Pegasos’ ‘lack of compassion and lack of transparency’ as ‘completely unacceptable’.
Anne Canning, 51, from Wales, travelled to the Pegasos clinic near the Swiss city of Basel in January to end her life
Chemistry teacher Alastair Hamilton told his parents he was visiting a friend in Paris when instead he was flying to Basel in Switzerland to end his life by lethal injection
Alastair’s distraught mother Judith Hamilton warned that other families should be aware of the ‘cowboy clinic’ called Pegasos
Under Swiss law, since 1942, people are allowed to help others to die as long as their motives are not selfish, such as for financial gain.
The law states that the person wishing to die must be of sound mind, but they do not need to be terminally ill or have any medical conditions. The country’s assisted suicide clinics are non-profit organisations.
Its most famous clinic, Dignitas – where at least 540 Britons have died in the past 20 years – has strict rules that its clients must be terminally ill, suffering extreme pain or living with an ‘unendurable disability’.
But Pegasos, run by activist Ruedi Habegger, says its users do not need to be ill to kill themselves. Its website says it will approve someone’s death request ‘in as little as a few weeks’ as long as they are aged over 18.
Though Anne was evidently suffering from depression, her family made it clear she was otherwise healthy.
‘She was one of the healthiest people we know,’ sister Delia told ITV at Anne’s home in Wales, where she and her brother John were packing up their deceased sibling’s belongings.
‘Anyone who loses a child probably wants to die and be with them. But with the right help, she could have got through it.’
With nothing but Anne’s suicide letters to go on and an envelope from a Swiss postcode, Delia was forced to contact several clinics in the hope of finding out where her sister had gone.
She had to wait several days for a response from Pegasos, according to ITV News, only to receive a brief message that read: ‘Anne has chosen to die… She died gently and not alone. I hope her letters help you to accept this. All official papers and her urn will be sent to her brother John.’
A statement released by Pegasos in response to the ITV investigation read: ‘According to our protocols we do the best of our abilities that persons we assist have informed their loved ones of their plans to die.
‘Should we have reason to assume that no information has been provided to close family, we will refrain from proceeding without credible proof that they are aware. This hasn’t been the case lately.’
They added: ‘We understand that the assisted death of a loved person is a distressing time for the family. We are very sorry if Pegasos’ actions or communications have caused further distress to any affected family member at any time and thoroughly consider all concerns.’
‘Finally, we’d like to emphasize that – since our foundation in 2019 – all our actions have been in accordance with Swiss law.’
Anne is seen at a climbing centre in family footage shared with ITV News by her sister Delia
His family were unaware and were stone-walled for weeks by the clinic before finding out what had happened to Alistair
Alastair Hamilton (2nd on left) and his five brothers in 2007
The 47-year-old schoolteacher with no diagnosed illness paid more than £10,000 to die at a Swiss suicide clinic – which then kept his death a secret from his family
Last year, the family members of Alastair Hamilton said they were prompted to talk about their devastating experience amid discussions around assisted death in the UK.
Alastair’s brother Toby said: ‘I’m not against assisted dying but you can’t let someone who is not terminally ill turn up and do this on their own, completely alone, and then completely disregard the family or next of kin. It’s a cowboy operation. These people are cowboys.’
Mrs Hamilton added: ‘Why Pegasos acted the way they did and agreed to help Alastair do this, I don’t think I will ever understand.
‘We’re all still heartbroken and still have so many questions, but I’m not sure we will ever get all the answers.’
Alastair’s family said he had been battling with low moods since 2022, when he began losing weight and feeling increasingly tired.
He had given up working full-time and moved back into his parents’ home in Hampton, south-west London, but doctors could not work out what was wrong with him.
His worried family paid for multiple private health checks, including tests for cancer and HIV, to understand Alastair’s weight loss. But doctors were still unable to diagnose him with any condition.
Toby, who owns a lettings agency, said: ‘Alastair started talking about suicide like he was talking about going for a pint down the pub.
‘I begged him not to say the ‘S word’ to our mum and said we would throw money at the problem, whatever he needed, until we figured it out.’
On August 10, Alastair’s father Edward, 85, drove him to Gatwick Airport. He had no reason to suspect his son was not travelling to meet a friend in France.
Before he left for the last time, Mrs Hamilton said her son ‘put his arms around me and gave me a big kiss, and just said, ‘Always remember Mum that I love you very much, I always have, I always will, no matter what’.
‘I was so chuffed to think he was picking up his life and getting some enthusiasm, and he was always very affectionate and loving towards me, so it didn’t register that these words were his final goodbye.’
Alastair Hamilton with his niece in 2015
Alastair Hamilton in 2007 with brothers Rupert, Bradley, Toby and Russell
Alastair Hamilton with his grandmother Doris Robinson in 2017
Portrait of young Alastair Hamilton
His family became concerned when Alastair stopped responding to their calls, texts and voicemails over the next week.
Mrs Hamilton phoned the police to report him as a missing person. Scotland Yard soon established that Alastair had in fact caught a flight to Switzerland.
An analysis of his bank transactions then revealed four payments totalling £10,310 to the Pegasos Swiss Association, a small clinic run from an office in central Basel.
Officers contacted Pegasos but, other than confirming Alastair had died there, the clinic failed to provide police with the date of his death or any other information.
As the days dragged on, Toby persistently emailed the clinic, saying: ‘I urge and beg you to please reply to my email as soon as possible.
‘Can you imagine what this is doing to our family in an incredibly traumatic time?’
However, the clinic did not reply for another week until it sent a cold email asked Toby to provide scans of his passport and to sign an affidavit in order to receive information about his brother.
Despite Toby doing this immediately, another week passed by before they finally confirmed Alastair had died on August 14, 2023.
Last night, Toby said: ‘If you had the slightest bit of empathy, and you are the slightest bit of a decent human being, you would pick up the phone and actually talk to the grieving family.’
Mrs Hamilton added: ‘I would have remortgaged the house and had his body flown home if I had known what happened, but we never got that chance.’
Only in October – two months after Alastair died – did the family receive his ashes in the post
The family have still not received goodbye letters that the Pegasos clinic (pictured) said he had left for them – or his wristwatch, clothes and other personal effects
Only in October – two months after Alastair died – did the family receive his ashes in the post.
They never received any goodbye letters, despite Pegasos claiming Alastair had left some for them.
They have also never received his wristwatch, clothes or any of his belongings. Toby said: ‘We eventually found Alastair’s application to Pegasos which was literally just like a two-page covering letter for a job application.
‘It doesn’t seem like they do any of the checks that Dignitas do. They’re not liaising with doctors for medical records or psychotherapists to make sure a person is ill.’
Childline founder Dame Esther Rantzen revealed that she had joined the Dignitas clinic after her diagnosis of stage four lung cancer, and urged ‘lawmakers to catch up with the public’.
After hearing about Alastair Hamilton’s case, Dame Esther told The Mail on Sunday: ‘We can learn from other countries where such laws are already in place as to what is the most practical and humane way of legalising assisted dying without making people vulnerable.’
Pegasos did not respond to several requests for comment from The Mail on Sunday.
This article was originally published by a www.dailymail.co.uk . Read the Original article here. .