Euthanasia

EUTHANASIA

One of the most controversial issues has been the question of legalizing the right of a dignified death or euthanasia. Like capitol punishment, or suicide, euthanasia involves the deliberate taking of human life. Euthanasia is killing someone for the sake of mercy to relieve great suffering.

This issue has fascinated and troubled sensitive and concerned people through the centuries. Plato, in The Republic condemned physicians who allowed patients to suffer from lingering death and suggested euthanasia. Derived from two Greek words meaning good or easy death euthanasia is often called “mercy killing” because the motivation is to act humanely toward one who is suffering.

On June 5, 1998 United States attorney general Janet Reno declared that doctors who prescribe lethal medicine to terminally ill patients would not be prosecuted. Oregon State’s Death with Dignity Act which was passed by voters in 1994 permits terminally ill patients to request lethal drugs to hasten their death; provided they are mentally competent and considered by two doctors to have less than six months to live. According to many legal experts it’s only a matter of time before additional states enact euthanasia laws that will ignite another series of legal battles and ethical debates.

While all acts of euthanasia involve hastening of death, all acts are not identical.

Voluntary euthanasia is mercy killing with the consent of the terminally ill or suffering person. Physician-assisted suicide is a type of voluntary euthanasia.

Non-voluntary euthanasia is mercy killing without the consent of the person killed although the consent of others such as parents or relatives can be obtained.

Another distinction is made between active and passive euthanasia. In active euthanasia, doctors or other medical personnel consciously give the patient an overdose of sleeping pills other medication or an intravenous injection of potassium chloride to hasten death. This is taking a direct action to kill the patient. In passive euthanasia, the doctor only withholds from a terminally ill patient the treatment without which the patient will die. A doctor may leave instructions that if a hopelessly comatose patient suffers cardiac arrest nothing be done to start his heart beating again. This procedure is termed “No Coding.” Here the doctor is not inducing death; it is the disease that is terminating the life of the patient. Consent of the patient or the family is not always sought. This is thought to be a medical decision.

Most legal systems punish any person who actively participates in euthanasia, although courts have been lenient in cases where doctors or others have withdrawn medication. The idea being that letting a person die is different from actually killing a person.

The question remains whether or not there is a difference from a moral point of view between the omission and the performance of an act. What is the difference between the doctor who starves his patient to death and the one who prescribes a dose of Seconal which can result in death? Many doctors and philosophers do not consider this distinction important. As far as the patient is concerned, it does not matter whether euthanasia is passive or active in either case the result is death.

Most Catholics believe life is sacred because it is created by God. They regard killing to be a sin. It is believed that man is not the independent master of his life, but a steward and subject to the sovereignty of God. They argue that one has not only the right to life but an obligation to go on living and that human dignity involves the acceptance of a higher purpose of existence. The objection to euthanasia is also the basis on which the church finds abortion and suicide unacceptable.

There are some who believe that even voluntary euthanasia should be resisted since it could result in the general lowering of value of human life.

A common argument in support of euthanasia is rather than degenerate helplessly the ill person can choose to make an honorable exit. To preserve life in a terminally ill individual suffering from pain and agony against his or her wishes shows a loss of respect for quality of life. Prolonging useless suffering can become a greater evil than hastening a death that is inevitable. Since the