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Death With Dignity Essay

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Death with Dignity Everyone deserves to determine their time of death. Of course under the giving circumstances a terminal illness. This was the case of Brittany Maynard who at the age of 29 was diagnosed with brain cancer. Her cancer consisted of a partial craniotomy and a partial resection of her temporal lobe. Her Original diagnostic was wrong, she later found out she only had six months to live. Doctors recommended brain radiation to avoid the pain and the likely hood it will increase her chances of death. She refused to let her family watch her die in a painful way. Maynard took the tough decision and “started researching death with dignity. It is an end-of-life option for mentally competent, terminally ill patients with a prognosis of six months or less to live” (1). Maynard was very well qualified, but unfortunately the State of California did not offer “Death with Dignity”. Therefore Maynard transferred to Oregon because it was the only state that approved the death with dignity act. Moving wasn’t easy, there had to be major changes “I met the criteria for death with dignity in Oregon, but establishing residency in the state to make use of the law required a monumental number of changes”(1). Even though Maynard struggled to have the right to die …show more content…

Maynard explains her struggles dealing with a terminal disease herself and how the Death with Dignity Act allowed her and her family pain. She hopes to persuade America to take action in legalizing the Death with Dignity Act, so everyone can die with dignity in their own terms. Maynard uses her personal experience to appeal to the general audience, specifically California, to join her protest against the illegalized law, Death with

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who can stay rest assured in a few states that if they want to end their suffering the patients will have the option. Peg Sandeen describes the reason why she supports the “Death with Dignity Act” her husband John had been diagnosed with HIV, his words were “ I don't want to die that way” at that moment Sandeen realized that a “Dying person” wants to “Decide how they die” (deathwithdignity.org). John only wanted to be in authority of his life until the day he perishes John's desire of being in control until the day he passes on only something the right to die can grant because clearly he has been suffering for many years from HIV and has realized he does not want to be consumed by the disease. John wants to live his life knowing the day

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“Whose body is this?” With those four words she single-handedly launched the right-to-die debate onto the public stage. She took her cause to court without caring what society thought. Knowing that there was a big chance her plan to legalize physician-assisted suicide would not work, she sacrificed her self-confidence by staying true to her beliefs and what she thought was right. In the end she ultimately committed suicide, with the help of a physician, proving her point; that no one could control what she did when she had her own fate decided.

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After Maynard went through with this act, the recognition for Death with Dignity began to soar but even then only five states allow this act to be done legally which needs to change. The Death with Dignity Act is an extremely beneficial policy that many people don’t know much about but when correctly educated on the matter many people will realize how truly helpful the act really is. The Death with Dignity policy has been around for over 20 years and has dated back and argued about since the early 1990s. It was officially made a law in Oregon in 1994 with 51% in favor and officially went into effect in 1997 (Oregon 's Public Health System).

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Lee did not want to go on anymore. Since he lived in Oregon, he was able to opt for Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act to end his life with a lethal dose of pills prescribed by his doctor (Karaim, 2013, p. 451). This occurrence is an example of physician-assisted suicide, which is essentially suicide with the help of a physician by prescribing the patient with lethal medication. Today, physician assisted suicide is legal in only five states: Oregon, Washington, Vermont, and most recently California. Undoubtedly, physician assisted suicide is a highly controversial matter; due to this fact, California will certainly have effort groups who will want to repeal the “End of Life Act,” by which Governor of California Jerry Brown signed earlier this month

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Public opinion polls showed increased support for physician assisted suicide. This was due in part to technological advances in medicine as well as a greater recognition of patient’s rights.” Twenty-nine-year-old Brittany Maynard, utilized Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act, took her own life in November 2014 following a diagnosis of terminal brain cancer. “A Pew poll conducted after Ms. Maynard’s death, revealed that people viewed this as a heroic act. Also, revealed, the majority of Americans, most likely including physicians, now favor legalizing physician-assisted suicide for painful and incurable conditions: 68 percent in favor, 28 percent opposed.

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"And I want to die on my own terms." Because California had not yet legalized medical aid in dying, Maynard and her husband, Dan Diaz, moved to Oregon to utilize the state 's Death With Dignity law. Oregon was the first state to enact such a law, in 1997. In the 18 years after, 1,545 prescriptions have been written for a lethal dose of medication, of which 991 patients used that prescription to hasten their death, according to a study released this week. Most of those patients, like Maynard, had cancer.

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“Be smart, be strong, live honorably and with dignity, and just hold on” (Fray). Physician assisted suicide or better known as Death with Dignity isn’t your everyday topic or thought, but for the terminally ill it’s a constant want. The Death with Dignity isn’t something that all people or religions are in favor of and nor is the act passed in all states in the United States. Only three states in the U.S. today, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington offer their residents the option to have aid in dying as long as all the requirements are met. Death with Dignity doesn’t effect just the terminally ill person, but as well as family and friends around them creating many conflicting thoughts when opinion if Death with Dignity is truly moral and a choice

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The dying patient no longer has quality of life, they have lost their independence, are lonely, are forced to endure inevitable pain, are publicly humiliated, are suffering immensely, and are forced to watch their loved ones grieve because of them. It is an innate Constitutional Right to choose how to die, since we all will die. There comes a point when the poking and prodding becomes too much, when the patient wants to just die in silence in the loving arms of their

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If death with dignity is legal in every state, so many people will be able to end their suffering on their own terms, but if not, terminal illness will continue to be met with a

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Everyone’s life has a start point and an end point. We all feel love, sadness, pain and illness. Some are fortunate enough to never have to deal with a life threating or terminal illness. Others are not as fortunate and must deal with the daily struggles of that illness. On October 27th 1997, Oregon enacted a law that legalized physician- assisted suicide for terminally ill patients.

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Assisted suicide is a rather controversial issue in contemporary society. When a terminally ill patient formally requests to be euthanized by a board certified physician, an ethical dilemma arises. Can someone ethically end the life of another human being, even if the patient will die in less than six months? Unlike traditional suicide, euthanasia included multiple individuals including the patient, doctor, and witnesses, where each party involved has a set of legal responsibilities. In order to understand this quandary and eventually reach a conclusion, each party involved must have their responsibilities analyzed and the underlying guidelines of moral ethics must be investigated.

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“Death with dignity is a human right: to retain control until the very end and, if the quality of your life is too poor, to decide to end your suffering; the dignity comes from exercising the choice.” says Jason Barber, whose wife, Kathleen Barber, died in his arms. He had one question in mind when she died. What was he going to say if someone asked him how she died? Whether she went peacefully? He decided to tell people that his wife died in peace, without any pain or suffering.

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The Death with Dignity Act has two arguments: those who believe we have the right to choose how and when we die, and those who believe we do not possess that right; that we should not interfere with the natural order of life. Every year, people across America are diagnosed with a terminal illness. For some people there is time: time to hope for a cure, time to fight the disease, time to pray for a miracle. For others however, there is very little or no time. For these patients, their death is rapidly approaching and for the vast majority of them, it will be a slow and agonizing experience.

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There are real case incidents in which a 14 year old girl suffering from terminal cystic fibrosis is asking her country’s president for permission to end her life. She had self shot a video in which she says “I am tired of living this disease and she can authorize an injection through which I can sleep forever”. The girl's video has sparked a broader conversation about whether euthanasia should be legalized in the largely Catholic nation. According to me we should let euthanasia be legal as there is no significance in keeping them alive against their wish as we don’t know how much they are suffering. Another incident is where the woman moved to Oregon where euthanasia is legal to take advantage of Oregon’s death with Dignity Law.

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After her death, California lawmakers plan to pursue the right to die legislation. Before she died, she said how hard it is to end a life of pain. This impacted lawmakers and citizens to start fighting for this right. However, patients are denied the right to die in a peaceful manner through euthanasia.

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