Alice and Ellen Kessler, aged 89, die together by assisted suicide
The German pop duo Alice and Ellen Kessler have both died together, aged 89, via assisted suicide.
The twins shot to fame across Europe in the 1960s and were credited with glamourising the TV network in their most popular country of Italy.
The Kessler sisters had jointly taken the decision to die by assisted suicide, and passed away at their home in Grünwald, near Munich, on November 17th, according to The Guardian. A spokesperson for Deutsche Gesellschaft für Humanes Sterben (DGHS), an association for assisted dying in Berlin, confirmed the news.
Wega Wetzel, the spokesperson for the DGHS, explained that the sisters both injected the life-ending drugs under the supervision of a physician or lawyer, before the police were then called per routine in these situations.
“The police come to check the situation and the circumstances, and if it’s all OK then it’s OK,” Wetzel said, before adding that their decision was made “over a long period of time and was well thought through. There were no mental health issues.”
In Germany, active euthanasia is against the law, but the country’s constitution states that people have a right to a self-determined death, which incorporates suicide and assistance from external parties.
The Kesslers previously told an Italian media outlet that their wish at the end of their lives was “to leave together, on the same day. The idea that one of the two will go first is very difficult to bear”.
Their career started in 1959 when they represented West Germany at the Eurovision Song Contest, before later being taken to Italy, where their status skyrocketed.
The sisters were seen as beacons of glamour and femininity in the country, following a period of strict conservatism and patriarchy. However, the Kesslers also eventually branched to the US, where they performed with the likes of Frank Sinatra and Fred Astaire.
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