Fahmeda Akther

ENG 21003, Sec. A

Professor Sidibe

September 24, 2018

Rational Suicide

Suicide is the tenth leading cause of death in the United States. The rate of suicide is highest among middle aged adults, between the ages of 45 and 54 years old. The second highest rate is amidst the elderly, from 85 years of age and older (American Foundation for Suicide Prevention). Within the last few years, there has been ongoing debates on whether or not suicide is ever rational and if physician-assisted suicide should be legal around the world. Some believe that the right to commit suicide should be considered a basic human right. However, others believe that aiding patients to commit suicide violates the Hippocratic Oath that every physician is required to take before being licensed to practice medicine.

According to the American Medical Association, physician-assisted suicide, or PAS, is when a medical professional aids a patient to end their life, by either providing them with the necessary means or necessary information to do so. In physician-assisted suicide, doctors provide patients with the medication to end their lives. However, euthanasia is a form of PAS, which allows the doctor to take an active role in ending the patient’s life. Oregon is the first state to start the process of legalizing PAS. As reported by the Oregon Health Authority, “On October 27, 1997, Oregon enacted the Death with Dignity Act which allows terminally-ill Oregonians to end their lives through the voluntary self-administration of lethal medications, expressly prescribed by a physician for that purpose” (Oregon Health Authority). This act requires the Oregon Health Authority to collect information on the patients in order to create an annual report. After Oregon, six other states have passed Death with Dignity laws, including California, Colorado, the District of Columbia, Vermont, Washington and Hawaii. Montano does not have a Death with Dignity statute, but it is legal for a patient to choose to end their life with a Supreme Court ruling.

The debate over physician-assisted suicide began with Dr. Jack Kevorkian, who was a medical pathologist. Beginning in 1990, he aided in ending the lives of approximately 130 terminally ill patients. As stated by Dominic Rushe, “…he operated out of a Volkswagen van to inject a lethal drug dose for people who sought his help in dying” (Rushe). Dr. Kevorkian was put on trial several times and served eight years in prison for murder. He believed that patients should have a right to decide how and when they end their lives. However, the American Medical Association viewed him as someone who “poses a great threat to the public” (Schneider). On June 3, 2011, Dr. Kevorkian died at William Beaumont Hospital, as a result of a blood clot. He wished to take advantage of the option he had offered to others, but he did not have the strength to do so while he was in the hospital.

Several medical professions believe that PAS is changing the role of physicians. The Hippocratic Oath is a binding document in which doctors swear to treat patients to the best of their ability, and to keep them from harm and injustice. However, by legalizing PAS, it allows the tools for healing a patient, to be used as a method to kill. According to the American Medical Association, “Physician-assisted suicide is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer, would be difficult or impossible to control, and would pose serious societal risks” (AMA). This changes the role of the medical profession because this is not the standard way of caring for patients. Students did not receive specific training on PAS during medical school. Physicians were taught how to respond to patients during the end of their life. When the cure is impossible, physicians are told to give patients complete support and provide comfort care and pain control. There are options to handle the end-of-life stage, rather than violating the Hippocratic Oath.

Supporters of PAS believe they should not be denied the right to choose how their life ends. Many patients suffer from illnesses that do not have a cure. For some patients, the pain, nausea, and psychological conditions such as depression and anxiety is too much to handle. For them, having some sort of control over the manner and timing of their death brings comfort. Brittany Maynard was a Californian citizen who was terminally ill with brain cancer. She and her family moved to Oregon to take advantage of the state’s Death with Dignity Law and to die peacefully. Her husband, Dan Diaz, continued her fight to get California to pass a right-to-die law. In an interview with Times Magazine, he talks about California by saying, “They’re trying to take away the option of a terminally ill person, like my wife was, to have a peaceful dying process instead of what, in her case, was a brain tumor that would have tortured her to death” (Calfas). By having a law that allows them to end their life with medication, patients with terminal illnesses won’t have to suffer waiting for death to arrive. Like Brittany Maynard, they can take a medication to have a peaceful passing and avoid having a tortuous death.      

The number of physician-assisted deaths are increasing in the states where it is legal. This is causing patients in other states to demand PAS to be legalized. On one side, advocates for physician-assisted suicide project the idea that an individual should be respectively given the right to choose how he/she wishes to die. It is based on the person’s will and how they view life. However, others believe that allowing this act permanently affects everyone in society. This controversy will only come to an end when every state completely legalizes physician-assisted suicide or decides to ban it.

 

Works Cited

 

American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. Suicide Statistics. American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, 2016. afsp.org/about-suicide/suicide-statistics/. Accessed 11 Sept. 2018

Calfas, Jennifer. “Overturning of California Right-to-Die Law Draws Brittany Maynard’s Back into Fight He Thought He Won”. 16 May 2018.

http://time.com/5279962/brittany-maynard-husband-california-right-to-die-law-overturned/ . Accessed 22 Sept. 2018.

How to Access and Use Death with Dignity Laws. Death with Dignity.

www.deathwithdignity.org/learn/access/. Accessed 14 Sept. 2018.

Oregon Health Authority. Death with Dignity Act. Oregon Health Authority.

www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/PROVIDERPARTNERRESOURCES/EVALUATIONRESEARCH/DEATHWITHDIGNITYACT/Pages/index.aspx. Accessed 15 Sept. 2018.

Physician-Assisted Suicide. American Medical Association.

https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/physician-assisted-suicide. Accessed 14 Sept. 2018.

Rushe, Dominic. “‘Dr Death’ Jack Kevorkian, advocate of assisted suicide, dies in hospital.” 3 Jun, 2011.  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jun/04/dr-death-jack-kevorkian-suicide. Accessed 15 Sept. 2018.

Schneider, Keith. “Dr. Jack Kevorkian Dies at 83; A Doctor Who Helped End Lives.” 3 Jun, 2011. www.nytimes.com/2011/06/04/us/04kevorkian.html. Accessed 15 Sept. 2018.