Hospital waives no-smoking policy to grant dying man's wish for a cigarette

Smoking.
(Image credit: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

A Danish hospital waived its no-smoking policy for a dying patient who wanted one last cigarette, The Telegraph reports. Carsten Flemming Hansen, 75, was told by the Aarhus University Hospital that he had just days to live due to an inoperable ruptured aortic aneurysm. He then expressed his dying wish to his nurse, Rikke Kvist: one last glass of wine and a cigarette.

It was Kvist's idea to wheel Hansen's bed out onto a balcony so he could enjoy his cigarette and wine in view of a final sunset. "It was a very cozy and relaxed atmosphere," Kvist said. "Of course they were relatives also affected by the fact that he was going to die, and they were sad. But it was cozy and there was humor."

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Jeva Lange

Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.