Euthanasia…The Right To Die With Dignity Euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide is a very sensitive issue debated in this country today. Euthanasia is the act of painlessly ending the life of a person for the reason of mercy. It is sometimes referred to as mercy killing. Americans are hearing more and more horror stories of the elderly tragically killing his or her spouse in order to avoid painful and horrible deaths. It is sad and amazing the extreme measures one has to go through to accomplish his or her death. More and more Americans are speaking out and fighting for the right to die. This however goes against all morals and ethical codes, for a physician’s role is to sustain life, not take it away. Although euthanasia and assisted suicide is not morally and ethically accepted, it should be an individual issue for those who face imminent death because death should be a personal choice, because death should be without unnecessary pain and suffering, and because most importantly death should be peaceful. Granted, euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide seem to threaten the traditional medical values. All physicians take the Hippocratic Oath upon receiving their degree. This oath states those physicians are to prolong life and minimize suffering. In an article written by John Glasson he argues: Physician-assisted suicide presents one of the greatest contemporary challenges to the medical profession’s ethical responsibilities. Proposed as a means toward more humane care of the dying, assisted suicide threatens the very core of the medical profession’s ethical integrity. (91) Physicians have a moral and ethical responsibility to sustain life. They are in noposition to render aid in a person’s death. Groups argue that euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide goes against everything they believe in. Although physicians lose patients...
