Assisted Suicide under Swiss law

Abstract:

In this short paper, the authors will first recall the historical context that led to the adoption of article 115 of the Swiss Penal Code in 1943. Then we will explain the scope of this criminal provision in more details and stress some of the legal questions it has raised in recent times.

Finally the authors will discuss present proposals and future perspectives on regulating assisted suicide as well as euthanasia in Switzerland. But as a preamble, we ought to define a few notions that are commonly used in the Swiss legal literature about end-of-life decisions.