Question Details	Asked By	Asked On
euthanasia	hotpotato	03/09/05
HI expert! i was wondering if you could give me some ideas for the following question for a discussion? How should our society react to acts of euthanasia. Do you agree or disagree? Do you think it's unjust or just. For those who are sentenced due to acts of euthanasia. For example I Was reading the Robert Latimer Case. Do you think the sentence is too severe or too light. Can you give me some opinion and ideas about the issue on euthanasia?
Answered By		Answered On
ROLCAM		03/09/05
hotpotato, Enclosed please find an unbiased article for your studies of this very difficult subject:- Euthanasia, is the practice of painlessly ending the lives of people who have incurable, painful, or distressing diseases or handicaps. It may occur when incurably ill people ask their physician--or a friend or relative--to put them to death or to allow them to die. It may also occur when ill people ask others to help them commit suicide. Euthanasia is sometimes called mercy killing. Euthanasia is a controversial practice. Some people believe patients should have an unqualified right to die. Other people consider all forms of euthanasia to be murder or suicide and thus immoral. Still others approve of some forms of euthanasia and disapprove of others. Active and passive euthanasia. Many people oppose active euthanasia, such as the injection of a lethal drug, because it requires one person to deliberately kill another. Fewer people oppose passive euthanasia--the withdrawal of life-sustaining medical treatment--for patients who request it. Very few countries have had laws specifically allowing active euthanasia. In the United States, no state has such a law. In 1990, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that patients have a right to passive euthanasia if they have clearly made their wishes known. People can express their wishes in documents called living wills and by granting durable powers of attorney. In living wills, people state what kind of care they would prefer if, due to injury or disease, they could not express their wishes. In the granting of durable powers of attorney, individuals name one or more persons whom they wish to make decisions about their medical care if they should ever lose the ability to communicate such decisions themselves. Self-induced euthanasia occurs when people end their own lives painlessly. In some cases, physicians provide lethal drugs that their patients then take to kill themselves. This type of euthanasia is called physician-assisted suicide. Few countries have had laws permitting physician-assisted suicide. In the United States in the 1990's, Jack Kevorkian, a Michigan doctor, focused national attention on physician-assisted suicide by helping gravely ill people kill themselves. Many states have laws against the practice. However, a law that specifically permits physician-assisted suicide went into effect in Oregon in 1997. Many people support the concept of physician-assisted suicide. Many of those who oppose the practice argue that doctors should not help people kill hemselves, because their job is to preserve life. Bye for now, ROLCAM.

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