Physician-assisted suicide is the voluntary termination of an individual’s life by administration of a lethal substance with the direct or indirect assistance of a physician. The issue of whether doctors have the right to help their patients die has been a controversy for centuries. Correspondingly, this term illustrates the case of Dr. Jack Kevorkian who helped a 52-year-old Lou Gehrig's disease patient commit suicide. The Hippocratic Oath, which is historically taken by physicians, proclaims: “I will keep the sick from harm and injustice. I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it nor will I make a suggestion to this effect.” After ruling in 1997 that Americans do not have the Constitutional right to physician-assisted suicide, …show more content…
the U.S. Supreme Court decided in 2006 that this issue should be a decision made by the states. Consequently, Oregon has had a "Death With Dignity" law on the books since 1997 that allows terminally ill patients to commit suicide with lethal doses of prescribed medication.
Additionally, about 46 people committed suicide in Oregon under the law in 2007. In November of 2008, Washington voters passed a similar provision that allows patients with six or fewer months to live to self-administer lethal doses of medication. However, Washington's former governor Booth Gardner stumped for the law. In an essence, physician-assisted suicide should not be legalized because it violates human dignity and denies equality before the law. Doctors should help their patients die a dignified death of natural causes, not assist in killing. Physicians are trained to cure, not to kill.
Richard Radtke, the author of “A Case against Physician-Assisted Suicide,” reports that the method of physician-assisted suicide varies in each state, as well as providing reasons why physician-assisted suicide is wrong. Consequently, physician-assisted suicide is legal in five US states. It is an option given to individuals by state law in Oregon, Vermont, Washington, and California. Additionally, it is an option given to individuals in Montana via court
decision. However, this aid to killing is not seen as a compassionate action; therefore it should not be legalized. “The only statistical indicators of Oregon’s assisted suicides are dutifully trotted out by state bureaucrats in a bare-bones annual report. By clever mandate of law, the information collected shall not be a public record and may not be made available for inspection by the public. Violators are expected to self-report. No penalties are provided for non-reporting. No watchdogs or media can review even redacted records. The government only reviews a sampling of records, does not verify their accuracy and subsequently destroys the records,” reports Radtke. Since the government does not hold any records of physician-assisted suicide, it is highlighting that officials are potentially trying to cover up the abuse towards patients. Furthermore, while euthanasia advocates market physician-assisted suicide as an option for mentally competent and ill patients facing unbearable suffering, implementation of the practice looks different. Rather than empowering individuals facing terminal illness to make their own decisions, the availability of physician-assisted suicide can pressure depressed, elderly, or disabled patients to end their lives. Euthanasia advocates wrongfully claim that assisted suicide is needed for terminally ill patients who face great pain. Nevertheless, most experts in pain management believe that 95-98 percent of such pain can be relieved (Radtke). In most cases, patients who request assisted suicide on the terms of pain will withdraw the request after pain management, depression, and fear.
The controversial act known as the physician aid-in-dying (PAD) challenges us to question our ethical, religious, and cultural values or beliefs. Although it is tragic and perceived as morally inappropriate, suicide is sometimes the only answer. In certain cases this act is a way to end excruciating pain and suffering. The state of Oregon passed a law known as the Death with Dignity Act in 1994. PAD is defined as “a practice in which a physician provides a competent, terminally ill patient with a prescription for a lethal dose of medication, upon the patient's request, which the patient intends to use to end his or their own life” (Braddock, and Tonelli). PAD also raises the question, is it a constitutionally guaranteed right for people to have the power and the medicine to take their own life? PAD, if operating under careful supervision, is an alternative to patients who may have to endure physical, mental, and financial struggles. Doctor Peter Goodwin, a physician from Portland, Oregon campaigned for the Death with Dignity Act, which he called his greatest legacy. Goodwin became a terminally ill patient towards the end of his life. Doctor Goodwin was 83 years old when he took the very medicine that he campaigned so long for. Goodwin was diagnosed with a rare brain disorder, which he had been battling for 6 years prior to PAD.
Several of the main reasons provided are, the state has the commitment to protect life, the medical profession, and vulnerable groups (Washington et al. v. Glucksberg et al., 1997). However, in 2008 the Supreme Courts reversed their previous decision and passed the Death with Dignity Act legalizing PAS for Washington State. This declares that terminally ill individuals in the states of Oregon, Washington, Montana, and Vermont now have the liberty to choose how they will end their lives with either hospice care, palliative care, comfort measures, or PAS. The question remains: will the rest of the United States follow their lead?
As any individual can imagine, there is a lot of suffering and pain in most, if not all hospital settings. At times, no amount of medication or experimental treatment can change an individual’s mind on the quality of their life, such that the only way to end their suffering is to die, hence physician assisted suicide. Defined as a patient taking their own life with the help of a physician, this assisted suicide practice is highly controversial and illegal in most but California, Montana, Oregon, Washington and Vermont. Putting the law aside, the morality of the practice itself is still questioned.
Intro: The Hippocratic Oath clearly states, “I will not give a drug that is deadly to anyone if asked [for it], nor will I suggest the way to such counsel.”Steven Miles, a professor at the University of Minnesota Medical School published an article, “The Hippocratic Oath,” expressing that doctors must uphold the standards of the Hippocratic Oath to modern relevance. Euthanasia continues as a controversial policy issue. Providing resourceful information allows us to recognize what is in the best interest for patients and doctors alike. Today, I will convince you that physician-assisted suicide should be illegal. The United States must implement a policy stopping the usage of euthanasia for the terminally ill. I will provide knowledge of
gotten to the point where they feel as if there is no point in living.
There are only three states that allow physician-assisted suicide: Washington, Oregon, and Montana. Oregon became the first by enacting the Death with Dignity Act which allows terminally-ill patients to end their lives through the voluntary self-administration of lethal medications, expressly prescribed by a physician for that purpose. (Oregon.gov) In November of 2008 Washington became the second and in December of the same year Montana agreed and became the third. A poll was given to Oregon physicians in 1999, nurses, and social workers in 2001. The majority of physicians 51% supported the death with dignity act, 48% of nurses were in favor, and 72% of social workers were in support. (Miller) These polls clearly show that the majority of voters are in support of Physician assisted suicide.
In conclusion, all should firmly believe that physician assisted suicide should not be legalized in any state. Although it is legalized in Oregon it is not wise for any other state to follow that example. By now, all should strongly believe the growing public support for PAS still remains a very dangerous trend. The role of our physician is that of a healer, not a killer. It must be understood that in some cases the only way to relieve someone from their pain is to let them go. On the contrary, each human life has an
Even though many states don’t support physician assisted suicide there are a few states that have approved the measure. Vermont, Montana, Oregon, and Washington are the very few that allow physician assisted suicide. Other states have not passed a law approving this action.. Oregon is one of the few states that allows doctors to preform assisted suicide. Oregon has a few requirements in the law to execute this procedure: the patient has to be at least 18 years of age, a resident of Oregon, and a terminal illness that will lead to death within six months or less. The number of assisted suicide deaths in Oregon has increased over the years. In 2009 there were 59, 65 deaths in 2010, 71 deaths in 2011, and 77 deaths in 2012. There has been a 30% increase of assisted suicides deaths since 2009 (Schadenberg). This shows that some states are more progressive than others in accepting and working with the terminally ill. The assisted suicide law in Oregon does not preve...
(According to www.mentalhealthdaily.com ) Throughout the United States committing suicide or attempting to commit suicide is not illegal. But Physician assisted suicide is illegal in 45 states not
Although widely condoned around the world, only one nation, the Netherlands has made physician assisted suicide legal. Five states tried Washington in 1991, California in 1992, Michigan in 1998,and main in 2000, Oregon in 1994 approved the “Death with Dignity Act” it won 51 percent to 49 percent. 91 people committed suicide with the aid of a physician in the first four years the law was in effect.
However, “The United States Supreme Court found that liberty as defined in the 14th Amendment does not include the right to assistance in dying” (Vacco v. Quill). It was later decided that the responsibility for determining whether assisted death should be legalized should belong to individual states. According to a report by CNN, in 1994 Oregon became the first state to legalize assisted suicide for terminally ill, mentally able adults. Today there are five states in which physician assisted suicide is legal. In Oregon, Vermont, Washington and California the option is given by each states individual laws. In Montana the patient must have a court decision. Oregon was the first state to pass the death with dignity act.
The discussion of physician-assisted suicide is frequently focused around the ethical implications. The confusion commonly surfaces from the simple question, what is physician-assisted suicide? Physician-assisted suicide can be defined as a circumstance in which a medical physician provides a lethal dose of medication to a patient with a fatal illness. In this case, the patient has given consent, as well as direction, to the physician to ethically aid in their death (Introduction to Physician-Assisted Suicide: At Issue,
"I will never give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect". A frequent quoted portion of the Hippocratic Oath, written in Greece sometimes during the fifth to forth centuries B.C.E, represented an effort by an apparently small group of physicians to build public respectability by distancing themselves from other physicians who commit assisted suicide. It has had considerable influence in the history of Western medical society and now, once again, physician-assisted suicide has become a major ethical issue in medicine, as well as an issue that involves law and public interests. Of the various issues at the medicine issue, perhaps none has drawn as much attention as assisted suicide. This topic is being discussed with great frequency in newspaper, journals and books about whether it is really necessary and ethical to physicians to participate in this life-ending act. Proponents or advocates of physician-assisted suicide argue that each person has freedom over their own life. Persons whose quality of life is nonexistent and who are having a terminal illness should have the right to decide to seek assistance. In contrast, opponents say that physician-assisted suicide is not an acceptable practice for the physicians legally as well as morally.
Diane: A Case of Physician Assisted Suicide. Diane was a patient of Dr. Timothy Quill, who was diagnosed with acute myelomonocytic leukemia. Diane overcame alcoholism and had vaginal cancer in her youth. She had been under his care for a period of 8 years, during which an intimate doctor-patient bond had been established.
Physician assisted suicide is illegal in all states but Oregon. Physician assisted suicide is defined by Religious Tolerance.org: a physician supplies information and/or the means of committing suicide to a person, so that they can easily terminate their own life. The decision of when and where the time of our death should occur is one that only God has the right to decide. Because no person or doctor has the right to end a life, physician assisted suicide should be illegal.