British journalist and presenter Esther Rantzen is known most for her charitable work and her contribution to television as a presenter. She is known to have presented the BBC program titled That’s Life! for almost twenty-one years. This program was important and influential not just for Esther’s career but also for the revelations that it brought to the public.
The England-born completed her education at Somerville College, Oxford, where she was also a part of the Oxford University Dramatic Society, eventually joining the Exford Theatre Group that performed in Oxford and Edinburgh.
She started her career with BBC as a trainee sound effects assistant, after which she worked behind the scenes as a researcher for the BBC-3 program. Her next stop was at the hit documentary series titled Man Alive, which aired somewhere in the mid-1960s.
Finally, in 1968, one of the producers decided to bring light to the researchers who worked so hard backstage, and this was Esther’s key to success and fame. Her appearance on Braden’s Week was finally replaced by the super hit series That’s Life!, in which Esther was the main presenter.
From 1973 to 1994, the show held a huge chunk of Esther’s career, and for all the right seasons. The show not only helped deal with a lot of real-life issues but also led to the creation of the first-ever national helpline for children in dangerous situations.
This helpline number, which initially was set up for twenty-four hours, was then set up for a longer time, a whole year, and now operates all year round and has twelve bases in the country. Childline, as a concept, has been put into order in almost 150 countries now.
Esther’s impact on society has been big, especially due to her big heart and empathetic nature. She came up with the idea of The Silver Line, which is a charity that works to provide support to the lonely elderly who might be battling isolation.
Joining The Dignitas Clinic
Over years of hosting and creating shows, Esther has shifted her focus to healthcare, especially that of the elderly. She has worked for better care for the terminally ill, all while campaigning for hospice care. She has been so active with her charities, using her voice on so many different issues, that we almost forgot that she has been aging with us, too.
The eighty-three-year-old’s recent announcement on Radio 4’s show, The Today Podcast, left many shocked. It was at this podcast that the presenter revealed that she had been receiving treatment for stage four lung cancer, a news that is unfortunate on its own.
But she also told the hosts of the show, Amol Rajan and Nick Robinson, that though she had been undergoing treatment, she is yet to hear if it is working to heal her or not. She further revealed that if the treatment did not seem to be working its magic, then she planned her next step to be at the assisted dying clinic in Switzerland.
She told the hosts that she had not expected to live long enough to see Christmas this year, and now that it was just around the corner, she was looking forward to it. She mentioned joining Dignitas, which happens to be a non-profit organization that offers physician-assisted suicide to individuals who might be suffering from illnesses that will lead to inevitable painful death.
The whole point of assisted dying is for people to go while still in relatively ‘good’ health and without pain. Not wanting her family to go through the pain of watching Esther slowly lose her energy and life, she has signed up with the organization, set in Zurich, as the final option.
The act itself is banned in England, and people who try to indulge in it can be sent to prison for as long as fourteen years. What has made this entire thing even sad for Esther and her family is that they cannot go with her to send her off in peace as they could be prosecuted and might end up facing a lawsuit, which is the last thing they need after losing a beloved.
Esther elaborated on her decision and confirmed that she did not want her family’s last memories of her being that of a frail woman who died painfully. She wants them to remember the happy times and not be too sad over her death.
She has expressed her wish of when and how she wants to go and wishes more people would respect that, hoping that more places make such services legal so that more people get to go in dignity and peace.
