In this essay I will dwell upon the issue of euthanasia. I will consider different views on this issue and discuss the contradictions that arise in relation to the use of euthanasia in different situations. I believe that passive euthanasia is possible and even desirable to alleviate the suffering of a terminally ill patient, when there is no hope to return the essential functions of his body, provided appropriate control over the lawfulness of the procedure implementation.
Euthanasia is a conscious action, resulting in the death of a hopelessly ill and suffering person in a relatively quick and painless way with an aim to end incurable pain and suffering. Since the beginning of civilization people have been exposed to serious diseases, making a person’s life miserable. Not all people have an enduring will to live, so for many seriously ill people deliverance from suffering is the only important thing. Thus, euthanasia, for all its inconsistencies, may seem the most logical or even the only way to stop the suffering brought by the disease. Attitude to euthanasia is ambiguous throughout the world and in any society there are opponents and proponents of this procedure.
In Greek "euthanasia" literally means "good death." However, in addition to voluntary interrupting of life with the help of a doctor, this notion should also include the termination of life of those patients who are not able to decide for themselves, for example children's euthanasia. In the history of mankind we can find a lot of examples of killing children with developmental disabilities, the elderly, and the disabled or mentally retarded people. This approach was widely applied in ancient Sparta or Nazi Germany: it was believed that people, who are unable to work or mentally retarded children only bring extra costs for the state and become a burden to relatives. In Nazi Germany, the implementation of these principles has also been regarded as a contribution to maintaining the purity of the "Aryan race" conditioned by the Nazi policy of the state; during the Nuremberg Trials such actions have been called crimes against humanity.
In today's world, the treatment of sick and disabled people as "unwanted" or "undesirable" is unacceptable. The problem of euthanasia now involves the deprivation of life only by the will of the patient himself or by the will of his closest relatives. Euthanasia is divided into two types: passive euthanasia, which implies the termination of life support therapy and active one, which consists in the introduction of a lethal injection into the body of the patient.
There are the following forms of active euthanasia:1."A mercy killing" occurs in cases when the relatives or the doctor, seeing the painful suffering of a hopelessly sick person and not being able to fix them, inject him an overdose of pain medication, which results in a rapid and painless death. The issue of the patient consent in this case is not even put forward, because as a rule, he is unable to express his will.
2. The second form of active euthanasia is a doctor assisted suicide which takes place with the consent of the patient; the doctor in this case only helps him to pass away.
3. The third form of active euthanasia occurs without the help of a doctor: the patient turns on a device the impact of which leads to a person’s quick and painless death.
The laws of some countries are quite loyal in relation to euthanasia; for example, in the Netherlands both active and passive forms are allowed. In some parts of the world euthanasia is either not regulated at all, or simply not tracked; these include many countries in Africa or Asia. In Belgium and Sweden critically ill patients older than 18 years can leave life expressing their written consent; Denmark, Austria, Norway, Germany, France, and Spain allow the use of passive types of euthanasia. In the United States more than 20 States allow the termination of therapy with the consent of relatives in their territory. In most other countries the law does not provide for assistance in parting with life in any form, and euthanasia is almost always punished by law. Regardless of whether a country is for the use of lethal injection and disconnection from life-support systems or against them, the debate about euthanasia occurs in most countries on an ongoing basis.
I believe that there may be situations in which the use of passive euthanasia is fair and can really be regarded as humane treatment of the dying patient, because in accordance with international standards he has an inalienable constitutional right to life and, in certain circumstances, he can use the right to decide the question of its termination. Obviously, most terminally ill patients do not want to prolong their lives, while experiencing physical and mental suffering. In my opinion, passive euthanasia is a possibility of getting rid of pain and suffering, if the patient has advanced cancer, tuberculosis or other terminal diseases. The second reason for the use of passive euthanasia is a possibility to reduce the cost of maintaining terminally ill patients: people often spend many years in hospitals already unable to return to a normal life. Seriously ill comatose patients need constant care and expensive medications: maintaining the life of hopeless patients in some countries may cost thousands dollars a year. Besides, in the most serious cases, voluntary euthanasia is a humane alternative to suicide, no matter how unpleasant it may sound. In the countries of low level of health care terminally ill people often commit suicide, seeing no other alternative to end their suffering.
Opponents of euthanasia believe that the main danger of its use is the possibility of the existence of selfish motives on the part of medical staff or relatives; an obvious example is the desire to obtain the inheritance of an ailing family member. The second argument against euthanasia is the possibility of a medical error, though hardly probable from the point of view of statistics. The probability of an incorrect diagnosis or inappropriate treatment contributes to further suffering of the patient or takes away his perspective on healing. All of this can make a person or his relatives take a wrong decision about interrupting his life. In addition, most of the world’s religions consider euthanasia absolutely unacceptable. Euthanasia, from the point of view of Christianity or Islam is just a common murder, even if the patient asks for it himself, experiencing incredible agony. (Pankratz, n.d.) Adversaries of euthanasia also believe that children's euthanasia is unfair from the moral point of view, because it is impossible to predict how the development of the child will proceed with absolute certainty. They believe that in some cases, the required complex of medical interventions and the desire of the child to live can overcome the disease.
In medical ethics there is a sacred taboo: life is precious, and therefore any talk about the price of life is immoral. Thomas D. Sullivan, the author of the article "Active and Passive Euthanasia: an Impertinent Distinction" argues that no form of euthanasia can be an alternative to conventional treatment. (Sullivan, 1977)
But life still has value, especially when a patient is in constant need of expensive medications, and neither him nor his loved ones have enough money for it; special equipment is also needed to supports the life of someone who is already doomed and awaits for death. Is it reasonable to spend so much money to the nursing of the terminally ill, while it is possible to spend the same amount of money for the treatment of patients who have a chance to survive?
Despite significant arguments against euthanasia, I believe that its use is a demonstration of mercy, while abandoning it in many cases prolongs the suffering of the patient. James Rachels in his article “Active and Passive Euthanasia” tells us how the rejection of euthanasia can lead to great suffering among terminally ill patients, which can be avoided by resorting to lethal injection. He says that in hopeless situations compliance with medical ethics only aggravates the plight of the patient. This or that way, passive euthanasia is a humane approach to solving the problem of the salvation of a terminally ill patient from unnecessary suffering. (Rachels, 1975)
One of the reasons for the application of passive euthanasia today is the cessation of cancer patients’ ordeal. For each person it is painful and unbearable to see the suffering of the dying. Contemporary people have forgotten how to endure pain stoically; at the same time, today people suffer from cancer much more and much worse than in the past. Paradoxically, this is due to the fact that there was definite progress over the past decade in the fight against cancer. Today people do not die at early stages of the disease and even in those cases when treatment does not lead to recovery or remission, the person survives until that moment in the progression of the disease, which was fundamentally unattainable in the past. At that terrible moment when metastases affect his entire body, a man is faced with exorbitant exhaustion and terrible pain. Previously, very few people lived up to this stage of the disease, but now it became the lot of most cancer patients. As a result euthanasia is becoming an increasingly frequent solution to the "problem of pain"; it seems monstrous, but practitioners of euthanasia often obtain thank you letters from the relatives of their patients. Patients themselves also support euthanasia, infinitely weary and exhausted. It is increasingly said that people should be able to exercise their “right to death" in the case of a deadly disease, which will still lead to inevitable death within two or three weeks. In fact, people who understand how terrible the horror of the pain is, or just know what it is by the experience of their daily work, are as a rule, supporters of euthanasia.
Thus, analyzing the situation, we should recognize that now the actual question is not in the provision of the doctors with a right to resort to euthanasia, but in organizing the corresponding conditions for it which will allow monitoring the legality of its implementation. I believe that we need a clear legal solution to the issue of euthanasia, indicating the inadmissibility of the use of active euthanasia, as well as a list of conditions that allow, in exceptional cases, passive euthanasia. The solution to this problem should begin with legal support and development of strict control over each case of euthanasia.
Works cited:
Pankratz, Robert C., Welsh, Richard M., /n.d./ A Christian Response to Euthanasia, The King’s Community Church. Available at
http://www.tkc.com/resources/resources-pages/euthanasia.html
Rachel, James. January 9, 1975, Active and Passive Euthanasia, The New England Journal of Medicine. Retrieved from:
http://www2.sunysuffolk.edu/pecorip/SCCCWEB/ETEXTS/DeathandDying_TEXT/Rachels_Active_Passive.htm
Sullivan, Thomas D., 1977, Active and Passive Euthanasia: an Impertinent Distinction, The Human Life Review. Retrieved from:
https://www.kibin.com/essay-examples/a-research-on-the-essay-active-and-passive-euthanasia-an-impertinent-distinction-QKrohYbj
