Euthanasia

Introduction

Today each of us has heard the term "euthanasia". First used in the 16th century by English philosopher Francis Bekkonom, it means easy care of life and before the Second World War the idea of euthanasia has been quite popular in medical circles in several European countries (Quill, 552). However, the politics of German National Socialists, designated as "racial hygiene", seriously discredited the idea of euthanasia. Euthanasia is a controversial issue in social ethics. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the term euthanasia from various different prospective.

Definition

Euthanasia is defined as the termination of an ill person's life in order to free him from the pain and sufferings he is going through. Most of the times, Euthanasia is carried out on the person's demand who is suffering from an incurable disease. Euthanasia, a word of Greek origin (from "eu," good and "thanatos", death) which means "good death" .(Sulmasy, 7).

Type of Euthanasia

There are two forms of euthanasia:

Active euthanasia: that means an act intentionally to shorten the patient's life at the request of the patient who wishes to die, or consent, by order of a family member or the medical profession. Passive Euthanasia is when the patient does not have a say in whether or not they die and their imminent death is hastened along - such as pulling life support, depriving them of food and water, etc.

Passive euthanasia: a treatment is stopped, thereby to shorten the patient's life. This distinguishes it from active euthanasia for death is natural, as opposed to active euthanasia, where death is caused by a lethal injection. Active Euthanasia is when the patient requests that he die and he asks his physician help him; for example, give him a lethal dose of medication.

Thesis statement

U.S. researchers found that more than half of U.S. adults support the right of terminally ill people to the voluntary withdrawal of life with the assistance of a doctor, so euthanasia should be legalized; however, there should be some restrictions to euthanasia.

Individual perspective

Pro Views

Everyone loves their lives and bearing pain is very difficult, there are patients who don't want to go through the pain or are unable to bear the pain then only they think to go for euthanasia. Patients who support euthanasia is because it cause no more sufferings to patient, No more suffering family, Cost savings for the family, and death with dignity. Everyone have their rights then why not the right to die, it's their life they should decide whether they want to live or not. Euthanasia relieves the patient from suffering (Lavery, 362). According to them, people who cannot be more or less tolerable to live without drugs, have the right to euthanasia. The man has a right to commit suicide and no one should force the patient to suffer, prolonging his life meaningless treatment. Euthanasia is used only for the terminally ill at the last stage of the disease. Another argument that proponents of euthanasia is: to terminate the life of the drug costs $ 40, and ...