Dame Esther Rantzen: ‘I don’t want to be forced to live longer than I want to’

Dame Esther Rantzen doesn’t want to be “forced to live longer than [she] wants to”.

The 83-year-old TV presenter - who has stage four lung cancer - revealed she registered with the assisted dying company Dignitas in December 2023, and has campaigned to give people greater end-of-life choices in the UK - an issue that will be debated in Westminster later today (29.04.24).

Speaking to the Daily Express newspaper, she said: “I want people who disagree with it to come or to watch the debate so that they can hear all the arguments for and against.

“I hope they will take into account all of the arguments and bear in mind that we want to offer them the choice, but we feel they should offer us the choice too.

“If theft are healthcare professionals, no one is going to force them to bump me off.

“But on the other hand, I don’t want to be forced to live longer than I want to.”

Esther emphasised she was “fighting for her family” and other families who have to suffer watching a loved one “[beg] to have their life ended”.

She said: “It’s a very complicated issue and everyone’s case is a bit different.

“But at the moment, there are families who dread having to watch someone they love begging to have their life ended and not being able to help them.

“It’s dreadful. Those memories outlive happy ones, they act as a sort of barrier.

“I am fighting for my family and I believe I am probably fighting for a lot of other families.”

The former ‘That’s Life!’ host stressed it was critical medics working in assisted dying should know that legalising end-of-life care would not depreciate their profession.

She explained: “I don think that very often, one of their reason [for standing against it] is that they think it would replace palliative care and undermine what they do.

“We now have evidence from the countries that have legalised assisted dying, carefully regulated, that it has a positive effect on palliative care, which improves.”