Isabel Torres, spokesperson for the Asociación Derecho a Morir Dignamente (DMD) said there are around a dozen more people in Andalucía who have requested the right to euthanasia but emphasised that this number is not official because the Junta under the Moreno Bonilla administration will not release them. For this reason, the DMD demands more transparency from the Junta.

“Other regional governments offer this information with no problem,” she said, adding, “what we want to know is how many requests have been received and how many have been approved, as well as the terminal illness they are suffering from.”

The law covering the Right to a Dignified Death was approved in June last year and the Royal Decree to assists the law’s development in October. The law recognises the right to euthanasia “for persons that are suffering from serious, chronic illness that provoke constant and intolerable physical or mental suffering with a prognostic for a limited life expectancy in the context of progressive fragility.”

The request can only come from the person who requires assistance to end their life and has to be submitted in a form that leaves proof of “unequivocal determination” from the person who requests it, as well as the moment in which the person wants it to take place.

Editorial comment: for the sake of putting the spokesperson criticism of the Junta into perspective, the Juanma Moreno administration is conservative and pro-life, both in the case of abortion and euthanasia, which is able to remain in power thanks to the support of the far-right party VOX, which has ultra-Catholic leanings.

(News: Granada, Andalucia)