The United States Should Legalize Assisted Suicide, Essay Example

The notion of legally assisted suicide or euthanasia remains a contested ethical issue in the United States. The crux of this debate, however, can be reduced to one clear point: should contemporary society be a society that emphasizes life or a society that emphasizes death? In other words, what are the moral foundations of the society in which we wish to live? The argument against legally assisted suicide is essentially an argument in favour of a society that tries its utmost to encourage and facilitate the life of its inhabitants. In other words, it is a society that is committed to caring for the ill and trying to improve their health conditions. While this may not always be the easiest path to take, it is nevertheless indicative of a clear ethical choice that underlies how to think about euthanasia: this ethical choice supports rather than opposes life.

Four key contentions may be identified in the argument against euthanasia:

1. Euthanasia is a commitment to a society that opposes life. It looks for its solutions to ethical problems in terms of death. In other words, opposing euthanasia means supporting care as the foundation of our medical system insofar as care becomes the ultimate ethical principle.
2. Being in favor of euthanasia introduces ambiguity in terms of autonomy. What happens if a patient is unable to decide for him or herself that they want euthanasia, but their families recommend it? Or what if the doctor recommends euthanasia as the only treatment?
3. If euthanasia is institutionalized, euthanasia can become a regular treatment practice of doctors. Doctors will then recommend certain patients for euthanasia. Giving institutions this power can have disastrous effects.
4. If euthanasia becomes legal, medical decisions can be made for reasons that are not in the interests of the patient. For example, euthanasia may become a financial decision or a decision that tries to create space in an overcrowded hospital. A legalized euthanasia will not emphasize patient care, and be influenced by outside factors.

Regarding the first contention, being a society that is committed to life is also a recognition that one of the key parts of life is making mistakes and human error. For example, there is always a possibility of a misdiagnosis of a patient that will then lead to an unnecessary use of euthanasia. According to David Cundiff, for a hospital physician: “predicting how long someone may live with cancer is very difficult at best.” (62) Being a society that emphasizes death over life as an ethical principle can only make the results of such predictions even more dangerous. As Cundiff suggests, “Doctors generally strive to preserve life with all their skills. They are very uncomfortable death.” (62) Being for euthanasia is being against the very essence of the physician’s profession.

Regarding the second contention, autonomy becomes endangered through the legalization of euthanasia because the decision making process on an individual level is already obscured by the legal decision that euthanasia is a possible form of treatment. This option, insofar as it is legalized, can infringe on individual rights.

In terms of the third contention, granting institutions this power can mean, as Morris notes, from the institutional perspective “that one’s suffering can trump the value of one’s life.” (181) That is to say, the physician examines the patient not from the perspective of their life, but rather as a measurement of how much they suffer. Treating people as objects to be measured can be obviously catastrophic.

In terms of the fourth contention, as Devettere writes: “In a society that accepts euthanasia, these patients cannot help but worry about the financial pressure their medical treatment and hospitalization places on physicians and institutions.” (340) The patient will be uncomfortable knowing that the physician may recommend euthanasia for any number of reasons that are oblivious to the patient’s care, as by definition euthanasia does not stress patient care. The patient could suspect the logic that is given for recommending assisted suicide and create mistrust in the doctor-patient relationship.

5 questions for the other team:

1. How can you endorse a medical community that emphasizes death over care in their medical practice? What kind of ethical basis is this for society?
2. How can you prevent people outside of the doctor-patient relationship from affecting the decision-making process regarding euthanasia?
3. How can you guarantee the doctor’s diagnosis? In this case, a bad diagnosis means death and human error is too prominent a factor in the hospital environment.
4. When euthanasia is legalized isn’t this taking away from the patient’s autonomy, by making a deadly form of treatment available to a doctor?

Works Cited

Cundiff, David. Euthanasia is not the Answer: A Hospice Physician’s Point of View. New York: Humana Press, 1992.

Deveterre, Raymond J. Practical Decision Making in Health Care Ethics: Cases and Concepts. Georgetown: Georgetown University Press, 2009.

Morris. John F. Medicine, Health Care & Ethics. New York: CUA Press, 2007.