Mental health: Olympe, 23-year-old youtuber, requests assisted suicide
On January 17, the young French youtuber Olympe, who suffers from a serious psychiatric illness, announced on social networks her wish to resort to assisted suicide in Belgium by the end of the year. An announcement that caused a stir at a time when the end-of-life debate is at the heart Of actuality.
Olympe, a 23-year-old woman, developed dissociative identity disorder (DID) following violent trauma suffered in childhood. On his Youtube channel to 259 thousand subscribers and on her Instagram account, the influencer shares her testimony to raise awareness in her community about mental health.
Through her videos, she evokes her difficult daily life and her fifteen personalities that she calls “alters” and gives her the feeling of being “fragmented”.
On January 17, in a moving clip that has since been deleted, the young woman shared her desire to have recourse to assisted suicide in Belgium to end her suffering.
An announcement that made a lot of noise while in France the question of the end of life is currently being debated. Indeed, on September 13, the National Consultative Ethics Council published an opinion which, for the first time, considered possible, under very strict conditions, the possible legalization of “active assistance in dying”.
In the process, President Emmanuel Macron announced the organization of a citizen debate in order to obtain proposals on the subject. Friday, December 9 began this famous citizens' agreement on the end of life. It brings together 150 French people drawn by lot who will look into the question of a possible modification of the Clayes-Leonnetti law in the coming months.
A “culture of euthanasia”
For the association Alliance Vita, which militates against euthanasia, the example of Olympe, “shows once again where the Belgian 'anti-model' can lead”. The organization deplores the promotion "of a culture where euthanasia could be a 'solution', even a 'right' for people suffering, whether physical, psychological or moral" and denounces a model which "shows the total ineffectiveness of the safeguards that claim to prevent these abuses”.
"The abuses observed demonstrate that from the moment the ban on killing is lifted, on the grounds of certain 'exceptions', a society switches irremediably, step by step, into a culture of exclusion - even self-exclusion. – of the most vulnerable. »
A “long and difficult path”
Following this affair, Yves de Locht, a Brussels doctor who was called upon by the young woman, spoke in the columns of the Parisian. He explains for his part that it is not so simple and that “the automatic euthanasia machine does not work”.
In the case of Olympe, he says it will be “a long and difficult road”. “You can euthanize young people but you need certificates or medical documents from psychiatry which will certify that, despite all the treatments, it is impossible to cure them”, adds the doctor.
As a reminder, Belgian law only authorizes medically assisted suicide three conditions :
“The doctor must already have a written request from the person concerned. Then, you must be suffering from a serious and incurable disease certified by medical documents. The third condition is to present physical or psychological suffering that cannot be alleviated despite all the treatments available. »
For its part, Olympus has decided not to discuss this topic on social media anymore. In a series of front-page stories on her Instagram account, the young woman deplores the extent of this case and announced that she would no longer talk about her suicide or mental health.
Camille Westphal Perrier
On the same subject read also:
End of life: the Council of Christian Churches in France recalls its convictions
Citizens' convention on the end of life: are the French really informed?
Tribune: "A law authorizing euthanasia is a law for the strong that does not protect the weak"
