Thank you.
Assisted suicide
- Thread starter superstring01
- Start date
yeah the choice should be allowed, however i sit on the fence on this one, because where will it stop? what if someone decides they want to die and then they find a cure for they're illness?
also what if we start assisiting children with suicide? next it will be, "i just dont want to live because my life sucks, so please kill me"
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Brussels, Belgium (LifeNews.com) -- Following a proposal in neighboring Netherlands, Belgian lawmakers are putting forward a measure that would expand the country's legal euthanasia law to allow doctors to end the lives of children without parental permission.
According to a Reuters report, members of Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt's ruling Flemish Liberal political party are putting forward the proposal.
Senators Jeannine Leduc and Paul Wille claim Belgian children with supposedly incurable diseases have as much right to end their lives as adults, Reuters reported.
"Their suffering is as great (and) the situation they face is as intolerable and inhumane," their legislation reads.
The lawmakers also want to legaliz the practice of assisted suicide so patients can kill themselves.
Last week, a leading Catholic official is blasted a proposal in the Netherlands that would allow children under the age of 12 to request assisted suicide.
Bishop Elio Sgreccia, the vice-president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, condemned the idea saying "the final boundary will have been crossed" in disrespect for the sanctity of human life.
Belgium legalized euthanasia in September 2002.
In all, 400 cases of euthanasia have been documented in Belgium since the practice was legalized and many more may not have been reported to governmental authorities.
Brian Johnston, the author of "Death as a Salesman: What's Wrong With Assisted Suicide" told LifeNews.com that the figure leads him to believe that "euthanasia is not being employed for medically indicated reasons but instead for culturally indicated reasons."
Under Belgium's "mercy killing" regulations, a doctor can only assist in a patient's death if the individual has asked "voluntarily and repeatedly" and has "thought deeply" about what he or she is asking.
The patient must also be deemed in full control of his or her mental faculties. Belgian authorities have interpreted that to mean that the patient is fully aware of what he or she is asking and is not being pressured by anyone.
However, a number of ethicists point out that the "right to die" often leads to the "duty to die," with people who are seriously ill believing that they must end their lives in order to avoid being a burden to others.
For instance, published reports indicate that euthanasia practitioners routinely engage in illegal practices that are abusive to patients.
In June, reports surfaced that three people with Huntington's disease and a person with Alzheimer's had died in the Netherlands as a result of euthanasia -- even though Dutch law prohibits mercy killing in such cases.
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and the man in the article that string posted was just Deaf and Blind, many many people live happy lives blind and deaf, so why did he decide to kill himself?
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LA there are children NOW alot younger than the age of medical consent (16) who are making decisions to die in places with no euthanaisa. For instance THEY are making the choice that they dont want another round of chemo for there lukemia. one of the case studies we did in ethics was exactly that, quite a young child (cant rember the boys exact age now) who was faced with the prospect of a second round of bone marrow transplants (5% chance of survival), chemo alone (6 months to live) or nothing (a week or 2). He had already been through the pain of a bone marrow transplant, knew that there was little chance of the second working and knew it would mean basically isolation in hospital till he died. He didnt want that, he made a very logical and passionate argument that if he had to die he would rather take the 6 months and spend it with his friends in school (from memory, and i could be wrong, this was actually a british case). The parents wanted him to have the transplant and the task set for us was to pretend we were on the ethics commity and decide which view point we should surport (again from memory the doctors actually followed the childs wishes and he recived only chemo), i surported the child. He was capable of understanding the choices and making his own decision which means that choice SHOULD be his.
Now i see apsolutly no reason why i would decide differently if it was a palitive care case vs a euthasia case. It makes no difference, if they are capable of understanding the choices AND acting in there own best intrests (they dont HAVE to act in what we judge as there own best intrests, only be CAPABLE of it) then i see no reason why those decisions shouldnt be theres alone.
As for your argument that a cure may come along thats always the case, it may and agressive forced treatment which extends a pts life by another 6 months can be done in some cirumstances (again cancer is the ovious example) but SHOULD it? What are the realistic chances that in 6 months we will have a CURE for cancer, AIDs, MS, and every other terminal illness you can think of? Its not likly, people WILL die and torturing them in the vain hope that somewhere along the track we might stumble into a cure (even ignoring the YEARS of testing required before human trials can even be run) is just cruel
Now i see apsolutly no reason why i would decide differently if it was a palitive care case vs a euthasia case. It makes no difference, if they are capable of understanding the choices AND acting in there own best intrests (they dont HAVE to act in what we judge as there own best intrests, only be CAPABLE of it) then i see no reason why those decisions shouldnt be theres alone.
As for your argument that a cure may come along thats always the case, it may and agressive forced treatment which extends a pts life by another 6 months can be done in some cirumstances (again cancer is the ovious example) but SHOULD it? What are the realistic chances that in 6 months we will have a CURE for cancer, AIDs, MS, and every other terminal illness you can think of? Its not likly, people WILL die and torturing them in the vain hope that somewhere along the track we might stumble into a cure (even ignoring the YEARS of testing required before human trials can even be run) is just cruel
I`m from Russia. Unfortunately, it`s a high corrupted country and it`s quite easy to escape the law in some cases. I`m afraid that people would force their elder relatives to an assisted suicide to inherit some property or just to get rid of them, because, you know, we have no social services that help people to take care of their elder and sick relatives. In fact, the goverment doesn`t care for the old people at all. The same with children.
To permit an assisted suicide a country must have a network of social services and good medical system and be law abiding. For Russia an assisted suicide would be a chance to kill and go unpunished.
To permit an assisted suicide a country must have a network of social services and good medical system and be law abiding. For Russia an assisted suicide would be a chance to kill and go unpunished.
superstring01
Moderator
Good point. Better not say what you're sayin' about Russia TOO loudly... Draq will come running in with guns firing!
~String
I don't think anyone would end someone's life no matter what age without ascertaining that they really did have a serious disease.
Choice is choice is choice is choice! Competition among various firms would probably lead to the most ethical, and most humane coming out on top if the people really want that.
Ha! I would!!! ..my next door neighbor ...and in a New York minute, too! ...LOL!
Okay, okay. But, VI, your statement is completely full of holes ....there are about a gazillion murders per day all over the world. VI, that's some people ending the life of someone else without ascertaining anything about the victim!
Baron Max
I'll give you this one, I didn't literally mean anyone, I meant medical professionals in charge of the assisted suicides.
I think you knew that already, and just felt like getting on my nerves.
VI to be honest there ARE murders amongs health care proffessionals sadly. I rember hearing of a couple of cases of nurses who were killing off there pts not because they were in pain and begging to die but because she LIKED it (she was one sick and twisted indervidual). That being said its not that hard to put laws in place which can deal with the small number of cases where the pts are being abused and murdered
Orleander to be fair most of the time they are used in the same way because they are related topics. In fact they tend to be contained in the same bills.
VE, is a doctor perscribing a leathal dose of a drug for self adminstration where as Assisted suicide the doctor is ADMISTERING the lethal dose. Really makes little difference which method you chose to use as long as your making the choice
VE, is a doctor perscribing a leathal dose of a drug for self adminstration where as Assisted suicide the doctor is ADMISTERING the lethal dose. Really makes little difference which method you chose to use as long as your making the choice
which is why its so hard for people to understand. They are not the same. One is with consent and the other is without consent. Do we really want to put Mom 'out of her misery' like we did the dog, or do we want her to make that decision for herself?
Until they are clearly separated, I don't see an assisted suicide law going into affect her in the US.
what the fuck are you talking about?
they BOTH involve pt consent
Non vollentry euthansia would be without consent.
i will try again to explain
If doctor gives you a pill which kills you and you take it thats euthanaisa
If however you ASK the doctor to give you an injection which kills you thats assisted suicide.
If you were incapable of making that choice (because of say alzimers or a coma) it would be Non vollentry euthasisa and if you were activly fighting the doctor that would be INvolentry (ie murder)
they BOTH involve pt consent
Non vollentry euthansia would be without consent.
i will try again to explain
If doctor gives you a pill which kills you and you take it thats euthanaisa
If however you ASK the doctor to give you an injection which kills you thats assisted suicide.
If you were incapable of making that choice (because of say alzimers or a coma) it would be Non vollentry euthasisa and if you were activly fighting the doctor that would be INvolentry (ie murder)
what the FUCK am I talking about?
I'm FUCKING talking about euthanasia vs assisted suicide. They are FUCKING not the FUCKING same thing. FUCKING euthanasia is one person FUCKING ending the FUCKING life of another FUCKING person. FUCKING assisted suicide is one FUCKING person helping another FUCKING person end their own FUCKING life.
You can't FUCKING ask for your own FUCKING life to be FUCKING ended if you are in a FUCKING coma!!
That's what the FUCK I'm talking about.
your wrong, compleatly and utterly.
Vollentry euthasia is NOT one person ending the life of another person. It is the perscription of a drug or treatment for use by a person to commit suicide. Physision assisted suicide is the doctor taking a direct action (because the pt is PHYSICALLY, not mentally incapable) to end the life of a pt.
Ie an IV injection is physision assisted suicide, the perscription of a pill which the pt buys and takes themself is VE.
Again where your making your mestake is in confusing the issue with non-vollentry and invollentry euthasia.
Vollentry euthasia is NOT one person ending the life of another person. It is the perscription of a drug or treatment for use by a person to commit suicide. Physision assisted suicide is the doctor taking a direct action (because the pt is PHYSICALLY, not mentally incapable) to end the life of a pt.
Ie an IV injection is physision assisted suicide, the perscription of a pill which the pt buys and takes themself is VE.
Again where your making your mestake is in confusing the issue with non-vollentry and invollentry euthasia.