Brussels, Belgium, Jan 9, 2019 / 15:34 pm
The European Court of Human Rights has announced that it will take up a case considering whether Belgium wrongly allowed a woman to be euthanized on the grounds of "untreatable depression."
Tom Mortier says that his mother, Godelieva De Troyer, suffered from depression for a majority of her life. Her doctor of over 20 years had refused her request for end-of-life treatment in 2011.
She then donated more than $2,800 to Life End Information Forum, an organization co-founded by oncologist Wim Distelmans. Shortly after, Distelmans agreed to carry out a lethal injection of De Troyer, doing so in April 2012.
Mortier is arguing that this donation created a conflict-of-interest.