Allowing Doctors to Prescribe Lethal Drugs to Terminal Patients

Introduction

Allowing lethal drugs to terminally ill patient who want to kill themselves is also known as euthanasia. One of the first laws to recognize the right of a one-by-one to pass away without prolongation of life by medical entails was the California Natural Death Act of 1976, sponsored by Assemblyman Barry Keen. He was provoked to preliminary the statute by his know-how with a close by whose physicians injected naso gastric and ventilator tubes without her consent. The Keene Act permits for the use of a “living will” to summarize the patient's yearn to “die with dignity.”

Clearly, the Court seemed to adopt the prospects that there is in the Constitution the reservation of the “right to die” as part of the liberty concern defended by that document; although, the Court did not actually establish that decision, but only “hinted” at it as something that would have to be decided at a subsequent designated day, with the befitting case correctly before it. A couple of years after the Cruzan decision, in 1994, the people of the State of Oregon passed by start the contentious Death with Dignity Act of 1994. Many assemblies are against the law, and legal trials to it produced in delaying its expeditious implementation. After numerous court assaults, the law was afresh submitted to the voters, this time by the adversaries of the assessment, but it passed by an overwhelming 60% vote.

Law about allowing euthanasia and lethal drugs

Every day, more voices are calling for legalization of euthanasia. So far it has succeeded in some countries something that is ethically acceptable. It has recognized the right of the patient to refuse treatment and extraordinary power to die peacefully and with dignity.

Reasonable laws can be constructed which prevent abuse and still protect the value of human life. The Supreme Court of the United States, in its 1997 Opinion from Vacco v. Quill, stated, "Even as the States move to protect and promote patients' dignity at the end of life, they remain opposed to physician assisted suicide.” Oregon, since 1997, has allowed people who are terminally ill, in intractable pain, and not depressed to obtain a lethal prescription from their physician and end their severe suffering (Giordano, 33).

Utilitarian Viewpoint

From a utilitarian viewpoint, suicide is immoral. Granted, it might cause pain to many individuals, but if it saves the suicide from a lifetime of pain, might this outweigh the pain the action causes? The concept of animal euthanasia inspired this thought. If a dog is in immense pain, we put it down, yet regardless of how much pain a person is in, destroying their life is viewed as immoral. This could be justified in that a human life is worth more than the dog's life, but does not that also mean that the human's pain is more significant than that of the animal?

The World Medical Association considered it unethical and condemns both assisted suicide and euthanasia. On the other hand, recommends palliative ...