A grieving mother has ended her life at a Swiss clinic four years after the death of her only child. Wendy Duffy, 56, a physically healthy woman, died at the Pegasos clinic in Basel after struggling to cope with the loss of her 23-year-old son, Marcus.
The former care worker, from the West Midlands, had previously attempted to take her own life. Her death comes as assisted dying legislation in England and Wales failed to pass through parliament, though her case would not have been covered by the proposed law.
Ruedi Habegger, founder of Pegasos, described Duffy's death as a 'sane suicide'. He confirmed that she was assisted to die on 24 April in full compliance with her wishes, and that staff had no doubt as to her mental capacity and independence of thought.
Duffy's son died after choking on a sandwich, which starved his brain of oxygen. She had paid Pegasos £10,000 and informed her siblings of her application. She expressed a wish for assisted dying to be available in the UK, saying: 'My life, my choice. I wish this was available in the UK.'
The terminally ill adults (end of life) bill, which had been progressing through parliament for 18 months, fell on Friday. It had proposed allowing adults with fewer than six months to live to apply for an assisted death, subject to approval by two doctors and an expert panel. More than 1,200 amendments were suggested in the Lords.
In a separate case in 2024, a 29-year-old Dutch woman was granted assisted dying on grounds of unbearable mental suffering, under a law passed in the Netherlands in 2002.
