Euthanasia is Wrong

Paper Summary:

This paper argues against euthanasia in all cases. The paper asserts that even if voluntary euthanasia can be benevolently motivated, there is a potential for abuse and mistakes. The paper discusses doctor-assisted and passive euthanasia in the medical setting and maintains that patients and their families are reliant on and deferential to physicians, allowing physicians to impose their own fundamental beliefs on their patients. The paper then presents the opinion that allowing an individual to refuse life-saving treatment by proxy is simply a passive form of euthanasia. The paper therefore contends that all these forms of euthanasia must be prohibited.

Outline:
Introduction
The Argument Against Euthanasia
Conclusion

From the Paper:

"Euthanasia refers to several different the types of act of purposely terminating the life of another. It includes involuntary forced killing, such as that practiced by the Nazis, aggressive voluntary physician-assisted suicide, non-aggressive withdrawal of medical support, and "mercy killing" or assistance in the suicide of a loved one suffering from incurable disease (Garner 2001).
"All forms of involuntary euthanasia are wrong, because the killing of another is, by definition, murder. Judeo-Christian religious beliefs prohibit both suicide and, therefore, assisted suicide, as do the laws of the United States. In principle, the only possible exceptions are those where a person of sound mind refuses medical treatment under the "penumbra" of implied privacy rights under the U.S. Constitution (Dershowitz 2002). In those situations, it is not actually euthanasia, since personal refusal of medical treatment does not involve the actions of another person; nor is the mentally competent refusal of medical care defined as suicide, because modern interpretation of constitutional rights includes the right to refuse personal medical care in general (Abrams 1985)."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Abrams, N., Bruckner, M.D. (1985) Medical Ethics: A Clinical Textbook and Reference for the Health Care Professional. Massachusetts: MIT.
• Breitman, R. (1998) Official Secrets: What the Nazis Planned, What the British and Americans Knew. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
• Dershowitz, A.M. (2002) Shouting Fire: Civil Liberties in a Turbulent Age. New York: Little Brown & Co.
• Garner, B.A. (2001) Black's Law Dictionary. St. Paul: West Group.
• Humphry, D. (2002) Final Exit: The Practicalities of Self-Deliverance and Assisted Suicide for the Dying. Junction: Norris Lane Press.

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