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Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne agree on Dignitas 'suicide pact' to cover life-threatening illnesses and Alzheimer’s disease

The musician says that if he “can’t live my life the way I’m living it now”, he wants to be granted an assisted suicide

Ella Alexander
Thursday 03 July 2014 16:02 BST
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Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne’s suicide pact has been extended to cover any life-threatening condition, as well as Alzheimer’s disease.

“If I can’t live my life the way I’m living it now – and I don’t mean financially – then that’s it...[Switzerland],” he said.

“If I can’t get up and go to the bathroom myself and I’ve got tubes up my ass and an enema in my throat, then I’ve said to Sharon, ‘Just turn the machine off.’

“If I had a stroke and was paralysed I don’t want to be here. I’ve made a will and it’s all going to Sharon if I die before her, so ultimately it will all go to the kids.”

Sharon Osbourne wrote in her 2007 memoir that the couple had agreed to go to assisted dying organisation, Dignitas, should either of them suffer from the common form of dementia.

Now, Ozzy has said that their agreement came about after his near-fatal quad bike accident in 2003, which left the musician seriously injured.

The musician has battled with drink and drug-related issues for years, but is now sober, thanks to the support of his wife. Tomorrow, 4 July, he will reunite with his band, Black Sabbath, to headline British Summer Time at Hyde Park.

“Every time I did drugs, I would come close to death,” he told The Mirror.

“It got to the point where I would worry about choking on my own vomit, so I would have to sleep face down. I do it even to this day.

“I overdosed all the time, deliberately on one occasion. It was 1981, and I took a whole load of Temazepam. I just remember waking up in hospital, having my stomach pumped.”

He says he realises how fortunate he is that his addictions didn’t end badly.

“I’m very lucky to be alive and realise that,” he said.

“Nearly all the friends I used to get p***ed with are now dead. I am living on borrowed time.”

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