Australian TV bans pro-euthanasia advert

Australia has banned the first televised pro-euthanasia advert which featured a terminally ill man saying: "I did not choose this."

Published: 1:50PM BST 14 Sep 2010



The 45-second advert featured an ill-looking man sitting on a bed talking about the choices he has made in life.

"I chose to marry Tina, have two great kids. I chose to always drive a Ford," the actor says. "What I didn't choose is being terminally ill.

"I didn't choose to starve to death because eating is like swallowing razor blades. I certainly didn't choose to have to watch my family go through it with me. I've made my final choice. I just need the government to listen."

The advert was knocked back by Free TV Australia, which regulates all advertising material for free-to-air commercial stations, saying it would probably breach television's code of conduct.

The code "states that material which promotes or encourages suicide will invariably be unsuitable for television," it said in a statement.

"Free TV Australia expresses no view on the ethical and legal debate surrounding voluntary euthanasia and has no interest in suppressing debate on this sensitive issue," it added.

Veteran euthanasia campaigner Philip Nitschke said his Exit International, which made the advert, had since submitted a shortened version for approval and would press ahead with accompanying billboard ads.

He rejected the proposition that the advert promoted suicide, describing it as a political statement about the fact that euthanasia was illegal in Australia.

Australia's Northern Territory introduced the world's first voluntary euthanasia legislation in 1995 but it was overturned by the federal government and euthanasia remains a crime in the country.

From: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/australia/8001974/Australian-TV-bans-pro-euthanasia-advert.html