Legalizing Assisted Suicide
According to West’s Encyclopedia of American Law, between 1990 and 1999, a well-known advocate for physician assisted suicide, Jack Kevorkian helped 130 patients end their lives. He begun the debate on assisted suicide should be legal or should be illegal. Kevorkian believed in the right to die, “The voluntary self-elimination of individual and mortally diseased or crippled lives taken collectively can only enhance the preservation of public health and welfare” (Kevorkian). He created his own machine that would be used to give the patient a mixture of pain killers and poisons to end a patient’s life. Kevorkian was charged with first degree murder for the death of one of his patients he had helped end their life. Kevorkian tried to get a ballot
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passed that would allow adults to be allowed to get assisted in ending their lives. “Kevorkian then attempted to place before Michigan voters a ballot initiative, Movement Ensuring the Right to Choose for Yourself (MERCY), which sought to amend the Michigan Constitution in order to guarantee competent adults the right to request and to receive medical assistance in taking their own lives” (West's Encyclopedia of American Law). Michigan denied the ballot and illegalized assisted suicide. As of today there are five states that have legalized assisted suicide: Oregon, Vermont, California (was legalized in October 2015), Washington, and Montana.
Legalizing physician assisted suicide wouldn’t just give the patient the right to take their lives with the help of doctors, but gives people who aren’t sick an option in case they were to get sick.
Legalizing assisted suicide gives an option to patients who have a terminal illness where they can end their lives painlessly instead of living a short life in pain or medicated with strong pain killer. Legalizing assisted suicide doesn’t mean the patients will use the prescriptions the doctor give them to end their life, "Vermont Health Commissioner Dr. Harry Chen said he expects doctors to write between 10 and 20 lethal prescriptions a year, with a smaller number of patients actually using the drugs" (Ring). Legalizing assisted suicide gives the option to people who are sick a way out, but it doesn't mean they have to use the option. Oregon has had physician assisted suicide legalized for 19 years where, "In the last 17 years in Oregon, doctors have written 1,173 prescriptions. Of these, 752 patients have used the medication to bring about their deaths and 421 have chosen not to use it, said Patricia A. Gonzalez-Portillo of Compassion & Choices" (McGreevy). Little more than half of the statics from Compassion and Choices show that the patients took the prescription. Compassion and Choices is an organization that fights for patient’s rights. The patients that did end their lives suffered from terminal illness from cancer to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) where most the patients were suffering from pain or losing their abilities to care for themselves and were put in a nursing home or hospice. Doctors give people who get sick medication, but when people are unable to beat their disease there’s not much a doctor can do besides offer hospice. Some patients would rather die than be placed in hospice care, "The "big picture" here is that currently, some human beings are being left to suffer long, painful deaths. Some would prefer to stop living - and would gladly do
so, were euthanasia legalized" (Archer). Some patients are unwilling to get help from hospice care and would prefer to die than get help from strangers because they either feel too proud to get help or feel uncomfortable with getting helped. "What keeps me going all these years is knowing the comfort and peace of mind that giving people this option for aid in dying brings to people looking at death in the face. Whether they fill the prescription or not and whether they ingest the medication or not just having the option gives them a sense of control" (Galewitz). There is no guarantee that the patient will use the prescription that is prescribed to them, but it is the person’s choice to decide if they want the disease to kill them or kill themselves. Legalizing physician assisted suicide gives the patients who are dying an option and those who are not dying an option in case they do get sick.
passed that would allow adults to be allowed to get assisted in ending their lives. “Kevorkian then attempted to place before Michigan voters a ballot initiative, Movement Ensuring the Right to Choose for Yourself (MERCY), which sought to amend the Michigan Constitution in order to guarantee competent adults the right to request and to receive medical assistance in taking their own lives” (West's Encyclopedia of American Law). Michigan denied the ballot and illegalized assisted suicide. As of today there are five states that have legalized assisted suicide: Oregon, Vermont, California (was legalized in October 2015), Washington, and Montana.
Legalizing physician assisted suicide wouldn’t just give the patient the right to take their lives with the help of doctors, but gives people who aren’t sick an option in case they were to get sick.
Legalizing assisted suicide gives an option to patients who have a terminal illness where they can end their lives painlessly instead of living a short life in pain or medicated with strong pain killer. Legalizing assisted suicide doesn’t mean the patients will use the prescriptions the doctor give them to end their life, "Vermont Health Commissioner Dr. Harry Chen said he expects doctors to write between 10 and 20 lethal prescriptions a year, with a smaller number of patients actually using the drugs" (Ring). Legalizing assisted suicide gives the option to people who are sick a way out, but it doesn't mean they have to use the option. Oregon has had physician assisted suicide legalized for 19 years where, "In the last 17 years in Oregon, doctors have written 1,173 prescriptions. Of these, 752 patients have used the medication to bring about their deaths and 421 have chosen not to use it, said Patricia A. Gonzalez-Portillo of Compassion & Choices" (McGreevy). Little more than half of the statics from Compassion and Choices show that the patients took the prescription. Compassion and Choices is an organization that fights for patient’s rights. The patients that did end their lives suffered from terminal illness from cancer to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) where most the patients were suffering from pain or losing their abilities to care for themselves and were put in a nursing home or hospice. Doctors give people who get sick medication, but when people are unable to beat their disease there’s not much a doctor can do besides offer hospice. Some patients would rather die than be placed in hospice care, "The "big picture" here is that currently, some human beings are being left to suffer long, painful deaths. Some would prefer to stop living - and would gladly do
so, were euthanasia legalized" (Archer). Some patients are unwilling to get help from hospice care and would prefer to die than get help from strangers because they either feel too proud to get help or feel uncomfortable with getting helped. "What keeps me going all these years is knowing the comfort and peace of mind that giving people this option for aid in dying brings to people looking at death in the face. Whether they fill the prescription or not and whether they ingest the medication or not just having the option gives them a sense of control" (Galewitz). There is no guarantee that the patient will use the prescription that is prescribed to them, but it is the person’s choice to decide if they want the disease to kill them or kill themselves. Legalizing physician assisted suicide gives the patients who are dying an option and those who are not dying an option in case they do get sick.