Legalize Physician Assisted Suicide

Imagine, in this moment, you are told you only have six months to live until you die from an inoperable disease. All of those family vacations, awards you have won in your life, and great achievements in your life suddenly become nonexistent. Not to mention, in those last two months, your family has to watch you sit there in a hospital bed and have your quality of life slowly dim to nothing. Brittany Maynard was diagnosed with an incurable brain tumor at the age of twenty-nine and was given six months to live. She began to research physician-assisted suicide and decided that it was the best choice she had left to save her dignity. Physician-assisted suicide is the act of a doctor ending the life of a patient who is terminally ill using a lethal
substance. As of modern day, physician-assisted suicide is only legal in six states. These states include: Oregon, Montana, Washington, Vermont, California, and Colorado. Luckily, she lived near Oregon; one of the six states to have it legalized. More states should legalize physician-assisted suicide because it would let people who are terminally ill die with tranquility and dignity.
Terminally ill patients, like Brittany Maynard, that sit in hospitals for the rest of their days generally feel their liabilities hovering over them. The main issue these patients have is watching their family have to pay all the hospital bills. Patients usually feel guilty about this because they know that when they die, their family will go into financial debt. According to an article that is for the legalization of assisted suicide, “The cost of maintaining a dying person has been estimated as ranging from about two to ten thousand dollars a month" (Torre 1). If the patient were to die naturally it would be painful for the patient, and it would leave the family in financial ruin. We, as citizens, must also consider that in the final stages of a patient’s life, the medicine does not take away the pain as much as it used to because the body has adapted to the frequent use of it. Assisted suicide would be a good option for a scenario like this because they would die in a calm area without any burdens. Not only would it fix the financial problems within a family, but often times when a patient
has a terminal illness they cannot die in a comforting environment because they are in chronic discomfort. An article issued for the motion of legalization stating, “As with the case of Maynard, she was told by her doctor that she only had six months to live. She decided to relocate to Oregon, allowing her to take advantage of the law and legally end her suffering with the aid of a physician. Advocates pointed out that it is but ethical for a person to keep his or her dignity by putting a stop to the suffering brought by terminal illness" (“Eight Main Pros and Cons...” 2). With regard of moral laws, terminal patients who are in the final stages of their lives should not have to go through a long and painful death because physicians believe it is immoral. This should be open for terminally ill patients to allow themselves to die as they choose with dignity and in peace. Having a prolonging death and the patient’s family at their bedside hurts emotionally for both the patient and their loved ones. There is no ethical way to die naturally in a situation like this, so the next-best way to die humanely would be assisted suicide. People going through assisted suicide should have the same respect from our society, whether they choose to have a planned death or die naturally.
Of those people who chose to go through with physician-assisted suicide, a majority were aware of what they were planning to do. Recent statistics show that people who go through with assisted suicide are well-educated and realize their choices, regarding the fact their doctor tells them multiple times. An article was published giving background information to US citizens about this issue and what would happen if it was legalized nationwide. The author states, “seventy-eight percent were sixty-five or older, 93.1% were white and well-educated, and seventy-two percent had cancer” (Harkness 4). Of the people who chose assisted suicide, a majority of them were knowledgeable and thought through their other choices and decided on this. This process is not easy; assisted suicide is intricate and complex to reassure that this is the option they want to choose. If this option was open for patients who needed it, it would leave the family with a feeling of completion. Moreover, this procedure would the leave the patient with a feeling of honor from their loved ones. Not only do they realize their choices, but they also have the respect from other citizens in America to go forth with this. The NPR staff took a poll before and after the debate about the legalization of assisted suicide. In both surveys, more people were in favor for the
legalization than against. They state, “Before the debate, the audience at the Kaufman Music Center in New York was sixty-five percent in favor of the motion, ten percent against, and twenty-five percent undecided. After the debate, sixty-seven percent favored the motion and twenty-two percent against” (NPR Staff). Countless citizens in the US know very little about this topic, which is why the percentile for undecided was so high. What people do not know about this is that it should be the patient’s choice to go through with physician-assisted suicide. It is their choice to end their suffering and we, as citizens, should have high regard for their decision instead of declaring it murder. Looking at it from a different perspective, people argue that the patient may have impaired judgments while going through this process. As said in The Right to Die, “Because patients’ judgments may be ill-formed and states of mind can change, especially among the mentally ill, society should help people die only when safeguards are in place” ("The Right to Die" 3). Patients having impaired judgements is one of the main reasons why the legalization of it is hesitant. The government feels that giving people the choice to end their life is too much freedom and can become dangerous. The government believes that if is legalized nationwide, that the amount of suicides will skyrocket. Since the government has addressed this problem, they have thought of a solution that will help the issue. They cover in this article that the government would solve this by making the process of being able to obtain the lethal substance more complex. They claim that, “These should include mandatory counseling about alternatives, such as pain relief, psychotherapy, and palliative care; a waiting period, to ensure that the intention is enduring; and a face-to-face consultation with a second, independent medical expert" ("The Right to Die" 3). Creating this extra step in the process would eliminate the issue of deaths increasing if it was legalized nationwide. An opportunity like assisted suicide should be open to help out patients who are terminally ill and their families, by doing so this option would let their loved one die with their self-respect still intact. With all things considered, physician-assisted suicide should be legalized to help out terminally ill patients who choose to die with the same respect as everyone else has when they die. Not everyone who has chronic diseases has the opportunity Brittany Maynard had. Not only do they have to suffer, but their immediate family has to watch their quality of life slowly become nonexistent. Instead of watching them suffer, we as a society should push for the legalization of physician-assisted suicide so that people who are terminally ill can die in peace. Imagine watching an immediate family member suffer each day they are alive and they have no choice but to wait until the day their organs fail to be at peace. It is not a pretty situation, but it is the best alternative in situations like these.