An Easier Way Out
Doctor Kevorkian and other so-called "death doctors" should be permitted to assist in
the premature deaths of the terminally ill. Although many states outlaw assisted
suicides, nevertheless, they should by made legal for terminally ill patients. These
patients may not want to suffer a long, painful death. The terminally ill will not get
well, they might decide to make the decision of ending their life alone if they cannot
receive proper help, and assisted suicides may one day be useful in discovering how the
human brain works or perhaps find a cure to some fatal diseases.
First, the terminally ill patients will not get better or become cured of the disease
they have. According to many medical physicians the expression "terminally ill" means
being in the final stages of a disease that is incurable (Hentoff, p.10). If a person
has a despairing disease such as AIDS, that person may not want to live the rest of their
short life with all the pain and frustration.
Next, the terminally ill might injure their body even more by taking up the decision in
their own hands. Offering help in assisted suicides to the fatally ill would prevent
anything like this from happening. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals created a law
that prohibited physicians from helping their patients die (Lemonick, p.82). Now,
patients who are terminally ill and who wish to die might decide to kill themselves in a
manner that is less humane than with a lethal injection or dosage of medicine. This new
law makes it much harder to get proper help in
attaining an assisted suicide. This clearly would cause many more problems than it would
do good.
Last, there are many ways that using terminally ill patients that can benefit science
and the medical fields. Doctor Kevorkian has been advancing a proposal to allow
condemned criminals and terminally ill patients to perform tests on their brains while
they are still alive and willingly know they will die soon afterward. Kevorkian claims
that these human experiments allow us to fully understand how the human body functions.
He also proposed to allow the criminals who are condemned to donate their organs for
transplant. (Hosenball, p.28-29). Through studying on live humans we would gain a much
greater understanding of ourselves and possibly discover some new medicinal drugs.
The terminally ill will not recover from their disease, they might decide to unlawfully
take their own life and possibly get hurt severely in the process, and the
experimentation on certain criminals and mortally ill patients would aid in the
development of new drugs. Allowing assisted suicides in our country would be a great
asset and opportunity for people who will not recover to end all the suffering. The
legalization of assisted suicides would prevent many accidents from occurring such as
people committing the act of suicide and being unsuccessful. Legalizing aided suicides
would also prevent people from killing themselves illegally. With all of the
technological advances in our community today the legalization of aided suicides is a
must. For the sake of all humanity and virtue in our society today, exercise your freedom
of choice and look at assisted suicides with a different, but, moral perspective.
Works Cited
Hentoff, Nat. "From Assisted Suicides to Euthanasia." Village Voice 14 May 1996: p.
10
Hosenball, Mark. "The Real Jack Kevorkian." Newsweek 6 Dec. 1996: p. 28-29
Lemonick, Michael. "Defining the Right to Die." Time 15 Apr. 1996: p. 82
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