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Is Euthanasia Morally Wrong

1266 Words6 Pages

Is actively assisting in euthanasia morally wrong? There is a huge moral debate revolving around the concept of euthanasia, which is the painless killing of a patient suffering a terminal illness or injury, and the morality in each aspect of this medical phenomenon. For the purpose of this paper I will be focusing on the morality of doctors actively assisting in the euthanasia of their patients. This would mean the doctor either prescribes an overdose of a certain kind of medication or administers a lethal amount of a drug to the patient that will painlessly kill them. On the basis that the patient is in excruciating unstoppable pain in which they will never recover from for majority of their time and they themselves ask for this procedure …show more content…

Positive aspects of morally allowing the active assistance allows the patient to relieve their pain early enough that they are not suffering unnecessarily, the patient is able to go when they feel they have had sufficient closure, and it can help aid their family in transitioning to a life without them by providing a set day to receive closure. Negative affect by allowing for assisted euthanasia could be that the patient misses out on the pleasures of life that may happen if they were to still be alive, the patient may make the call too earlier because of an increase of pain at the time, and the family may suffer a greater loss due to the fact the patient chose to die and not allowing for it to naturally occur. Some of …show more content…

They can point to the fact that if the patient was not in pain then they would want to stay alive as long as possible even though they are terminally ill therefore we ought to morally reject doctors participating in euthanasia since the patient's judgment is clouded by the pain they are in. We can not ignore the fact that pain can cause patients to be more desperate to end their situation and if their pain were to subside they may not want to end their life so early. Though we can acknowledge that “fully reliable pain control is a myth” (Battin 1987, 63) meaning for most patients there is no way to thier relieve pain enough where their judgment is no longer clouded. As discussed previously it is the doctor's least disputed moral obligation is to provide pain relief and if there is no reliable pain control method and restrictions are put on what they can offer their patients then how do we expect them to uphold this obligation to every patient they come across in their career. Based off of the fact no universal and reliable pain control method exists, and that doctors have a moral obligation to provide pain relief to patients, then we ought to morally accept doctors actively participating in euthanasia as a way to provide a guaranteed pain relief to their

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