December 18, 2025
Inside workshop where ‘Dr Death’ reveals new suicide invention
Tea, biscuits and confronting end-of-life demonstrations collide as Dr Philip Nitschke gives a select crowd rare access to his controversial death workshop by Sophie Elsworth.
December 13, 2025 – 5:00AM
Sitting alongside a plastic mannequin head wearing a suicide collar, euthanasia advocate Dr Philip Nitschke tells a small group of people at a Dutch workshop quick and easy ways to end their life.
The Australian doctor is centre stage at his latest ‘death workshop’, held on a crisp Monday morning in the small city of Amersfoort, 45km southeast of Amsterdam.
Speaking in an unassuming converted residential unit block, the euthanasia advocate is showcasing an array of methods for a person to kill themselves.
About 20 attendees are hanging on his every word.
This masthead received permission from Dr Nitschke, who lives in the Netherlands, to attend the workshop.
Dr Philip Nitschke talks to about 20 attendees at his latest ‘death workshop’. Picture: Sophie Elsworth
Cups of tea and biscuits are served and homemade packed lunches consumed at the event that is predominantly attended by ‘buddies’ who help people who plan a date for their death.
The buddy’s job is to speak with the person and make them comfortable in their final hours, often in their own home.
The buddy films the death – but does not assist in any way – and then contacts police who attend and take the body away.
Other attendees have come to seek detailed information on how they can die of their own volition.
Brochures from Dr Nitschke’s pro-euthanasia group Exit International are handed out and the groups’ mission is clear: “it is the fundamental human right of every rational adult to control the circumstance of their own death … the timing, location and the know-how”.
In Australia, voluntary assisted dying (VAD) is permitted but a strict process must be followed including that the person has a terminal illness, disease or medical condition.
The illness must mean that they are expected to die within a certain time frame – usually less than a year – and be of sound mind to make the decision.
But there’s no doubt over the decades Dr Nitsche’s pro-euthanasia stance in developing new and innovative ways to die, has been met with much opposition.
KAIROS KOLLAR
Dr Nitschke’s newest invention, the Kairos Kollar, sits on display next to him at the Dutch workshop.
“It works in a clever way by putting pressure in two important points on your neck that does two things, the pressure stops the flow of blood to two important arteries,” he said as he presses his fingers into his throat.
“The collar is put around your neck and when you press the button it suddenly puts pressure on the carotid and the vertebral artery and stops the flow of blood going up to your brain”.
Dr Nitschke told this masthead it’s a method “that can’t easily be stopped because the government can ban (it)”.
“You can build your own collar and suicide is not a crime,” he said.
“It will work like an airbag in the car, when you press a button, bang, faint and die”.
SARCO POD
Next up, Dr Nitschke plugs in his inflatable Sarco Pod to demonstrate the singular version of the human-sized capsule. This is all he has because the real Sarco pod was seized by Swiss authorities last year.
“The inflatable Sarco is really just a way of giving people an idea of how big the device is, so they can visualise what it would be like,” Dr Nitschke said.
“The real one is exactly the same size, but of course, you climb in, you press a button and you die.
“(The mock capsule) also allowed us to take photographs of what it looked like, we took photographs (of it) in front of Ayers Rock/Uluru, the Sydney Harbour and the Opera House.
“It sits on a generator which produces a lot of nitrogen quietly, rapidly … you climb in, lie back and press a button and rapidly the oxygen level … drops and you take a couple of deep breaths, you lose consciousness and you die”.
But it doesn’t end there, he’s in the throes of building a dual Sarco pod because he said the demand for couples wanting to die together is on the incline.
He expects it to be ready early in 2026.
DEATH SWITCH
Another suicide method Dr Nitschke is developing is dubbed the suicide switch.
He said it will be a game changer for people suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.
“What the death switch does is to try and resolve what happens when you lose mental capacity, you’re not eligible under any of the laws, you have got to do is have mental capacity,” he said.
“The switch is a small device implanted into your leg and you set it for a year, two years, five years whatever.
“After two or five years, the timer starts to make a noise, tick, tick, tick, and you think what’s that thing ticking is you just reset it but if you’ve become so demented that you don’t know what it is, you’ve forgotten or don’t understand, it ticks for a day or two on timing and then it kills you.”
HAVING CONTROL
Dr Nitschke explains that “people want absolute control” when it comes to determining when, where and how they die.
“They don’t want something that the medical profession dolls out if you can beg hard enough,” he said.
“We want it as a human right, it is a right to die if you’re of sound mind and an adult.”
That’s why Switzerland has become a popular destination where people choose to die because unlike many other countries including Australia, you don’t have to be sick to want to end your life early.
Suicide is legal in Switzerland but on September 23 last year Dr Nitschke and German doctor Florian Willet were caught up in a scandal after his Sarco pod was used for by an American woman to kill herself in a forest located in Schaffhausen.
At the workshop Dr Nitschke shows vision of the woman dying – a deadly nitrogen gas was released inside the capsule.
He watched her death at the time remotely via video link, while Dr Willet had a mental breakdown after he was arrested and detained by Swiss police afterwards.
He took his own life in May this year and the case is still under investigation.
DOCTOR DEATH
As the architect of the original euthanasia laws in the Northern Territory in 1995, Dr Nitschke was dubbed “Doctor Death” – a title which appears to still make him uncomfortable.
While he “was proud of what happened in the Northern Territory” he was appalled at the legislation being overturned federally two years later.
“… to watch the federal government under John Howard and politicians like Kevin Andrews who is now deceased, politicians in federal parliament overturned that law because they were embarrassed of what the Northern Territory had done,” Dr Nitschke said.
“And here we are 30 years later and Australia is slowly coming back to catching up with the rest of the world but briefly we led the world and it’s something to be proud of”.
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