Piergiorgio Welby

Piergiorgio Welby ( born December 26, 1945 in Rome, † December 20, 2006 ibid ) was co-president of the Italian Associazione Luca Coscioni. He became famous when he nudged a public debate about euthanasia in 2006. In Italy, both the active and passive euthanasia criminally prohibited.

Course

In 1963, a progressive muscular dystrophy was diagnosed in Welby, with him, the doctor predicted a life expectancy of more than twenty years. Since the eighties, he was confined to a wheelchair. However, Welby was in 2006 at the last stage of the disease, was almost completely paralyzed, bedridden and unable to speak. In addition, he needed ten years a respirator. He could only communicate through his eye movements using a special apparatus.

On 22 September 2006, an open letter, connected to a video, the Italian President Giorgio Napolitano was published in the Welby demanded the right to self-determined dying. Napolitano replied immediately and called on them to lead a political debate on the subject. On 16 December 2006, the competent court in Rome rejected Welby's request for passive euthanasia. Welby died anyway on 20 December 2006 with the help of his doctor, Mario Riccio, who gave him an anesthetic and then shuts down the ventilator. The then raised murder charge against Riccio was rejected by a court in Rome. The Catholic Church refused him then a church burial.