30 years ago, on September 22 1996, Dr Philip Nitschke became the first doctor in the world to legally administer a lethal voluntary injection under the Northern Territory's new Rights of the Terminally Ill (ROTI) Act. In this interview with Dylan Bird, Dr Nitschke looks back on that historic day in September 1996 when prostate cancer sufferer Bob Dent used Nitschke's ‘Deliverance Machine’.

"That immense sense of relief on my part, that he had finally got what he wanted... I watched the event, immensely relieved that the machine worked according to what had been hoped. And I also realised that this was the first legal lethal voluntery injection that had ever been given and that life wasn't gonna be the same after it and indeed it wasn't."

The Rights of the Terminally Ill (ROTI) Act was soon overturned by federal parliament, but it kicked off a movement that's seen Voluntary Assisted Dying legalised in every Australian state and in countries overseas. Dr Nitschke went on to found Exit International, originally called Voluntary Euthanasia Research Foundation (VERF), and he's in Canberra this week for the organisation's conference marking the important anniversary.

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