ESTHER RANTZEN: I MAY 'BUZZ OFF' TO DIGNITAS FOR SAKE OF MY FAMILY

Star calls for vote on assisted dying so relatives avoid painful, bad death’

- Giles Sheldrick

DAME Esther Rantzen is considering "buzzing off" to Dignitas to spare her family from the final hours of a painful death.

The TV star and campaigner, 83, has signed up to the Swiss assisted dying centre as she battles stage four lung cancer.

She said: "My family say it's my decision and my choice." And as Dame Esther prepares to enjoy a Christmas she feared she would not live to see, she has called for a free vote among MPs on assisted dying and backed the Daily Express's Give Us Our Last Rights Campaign.

Dame Esther said going to Zurich would be her final selfless act for her loved ones.

She added: "I explained to them that, actually, I don't want their last memories of me to be painful.

"Because if you watch someone you love having a bad death, that memory obliterates all the happy times. I don't want that to happen.

"I don't want to be that sort of victim in their lives."

Dame Esther, who was diagnosed with lung cancer last January, has spent a lifetime fighting injustices and championing the underdog.

But her plight has made her contemplate her life, legacy and those less fortunate than herself.

If Dame Esther was Prime Minister for a day she said she would call for a free vote on assisted dying, adding: "It's important that the law catches up with what the country wants."

She also told the BBC's The Today Podcast her next scan "that tells me whether the miracle drug is performing its miracle or whether it's given up" is not scheduled "for quite a few weeks" yet.

She said: "I didn't think I would make it to my birthday [June 22]. I definitely didn't think I'd make it to this Christmas, which I am, it appears.

"The Christmas I didn't expect to have with my family is going to be so precious, and I think that once it's over, I would like to relive it.