Euthanasia: Unethical And Immoral

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Despite one’s medical condition, euthanasia should not be an end of life choice. But what is euthanasia or doctor-assisted suicide? Euthanasia is defined as "the bringing about of a gentle and easy death for a person suffering from a painful incurable disease," while Suicide on the other hand, is "the intentional killing of oneself." Doctor-assisted suicide combines both of these definitions with the idea of a physician helping a terminally ill patient to die. Doctors can perform euthanasia by giving a patient a lethal injection or by prescribing a lethal dose of drugs (“Euthanasia”). Active euthanasia is actually taking proactive measures to help a person die. Opposite active euthanasia which is defined as "allowing to die," and is used to describe a decision to withhold treatment, remove life support, etc. from a patient who may be in a coma or vegetative state (Issues and Controversies).

The United States has long outlawed assisted suicide. People who help others kill themselves have been charged with murder, manslaughter, etc. For many years, right-to-die groups have attempted to change the laws saying that euthanasia is compassionate. Compassion, when literally defined, means: “to suffer with another”. That is why the monopolization of the word by proponents of euthanasia and assisted suicide is so discordant. Euthanasia isn’t about suffering with anybody. It’s is about using someone’s suffering - and the pity it evokes - as a justification to kill (Miller et al. [40-41]).

Advocates of right-to-die were unsuccessful until 1994 when Oregon voters approved the Death with Dignity Act allowing physician-assisted suicide. The Act was blocked for three years by critics and those who opposed the Act. These people challenged the c...

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...ion for Mrs. Crick, had she been terminally ill, an autopsy showed that her colon cancer had not recurred, should have been to die naturally with people who cared for her present and good palliative care. Of people who requested assisted suicide under Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act, which allows physicians to prescribe lethal medication, 46 percent changed their minds after significant palliative-care interventions (relief of pain and other symptoms) (Miller et al. [37]).

How a society treats its weakest, most in need, most vulnerable members best tests its moral and ethical tone. To set a present and future moral tone that protects individuals in general and society, upholds the fundamental value of respect for life, and promotes rather than destroys our capacities and opportunities to search for meaning in life, we must reject euthanasia (Miller et al. [37]).

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