Piergiorgio Welby

Who was Piergiorgio Welby?

Piergiorgio Welby was an Italian poet, painter and activist whose three-month-long battle to establish his right to die led to a debate about euthanasia in his country.

Welby was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy as a teenager in the early 1960s. The disease progressed, and in 1997 he became unable to breathe on his own. He became politically active in the right-to-die movement, and in 2006 he publicly declared his wish to refuse the medical treatment that kept him alive. The case was controversial, with liberal politicians supporting him and conservatives and the Vatican speaking out against his cause. After three months, he was allowed to die, though he was denied a church burial.