Pros And Cons Of Physician Assisted Suicide

Physician-Assisted Suicide (PAS) is the voluntary termination of one's own life by administration of a lethal substance with the direct or indirect assistance of a physician. This has been a quite controversial topic, being a debated issue for nearly two decades and counting. There are two sides to this topic, opponents arguing that PAS is genuinely against fundamental codes of medicine. In contrast, I agree with the proponents of assisted suicide, which argue that the government should allow sickly individuals to choose their fate in a critical time. Experts have noted assisted suicide as a large concern for our government due to its extremely tricky nature. With the increasing public acceptance of the right of patients to refuse life-sustaining

However, there are important moral and legal distinctions between patients' refusals of therapy and requests for certain actions. Physicians must stop life-sustaining therapy when that therapy has been validly refused by patients. They have no similar duty to provide actions, such as assistance in suicide, simply because they have been requested by patients. This exact distinction marks the point where legalizing assisted suicide isn’t as easy as simply passing legislation, although many proponents would like to think it is. The first governmental action associated with PAS was made in 1997, when the Supreme Court ruled that there was no Constitutional precedent or right to assisted suicide. Although from then to 2016, six states have legalized this controversial practice (California, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Vermont, and New Mexico) despite the fact that numerous states refuse to even address the problem because of its abstract nature. On the contrary, the other side of this fine line entails the opinions of the citizens of the United States. According to a recent PEW Research poll, 47% of Americans are in

Law is typically concerned and often stuck on deciding who decides. The national government believes it should be a their responsibility to keep the U.S. equal and balanced because of the Supremacy Clause. However, the states thinks it should be a local, state chosen decision whether or not PAS is legalized. Each state has its own beliefs and ideals, which is why only six states have legalized it in total. That is also the reason why numerous states refuse to address the issue by any means. Despite all of this back-and-forth, it has ultimately been decided to allow the states to choose for themselves on this topic, which is similar to the death penalty. Being able to decide state-by-state is only because the founding fathers never addressed anything about it in the Constitution, and the Supreme Court ruled no precedent on it. Moreover, the other structural issue of assisted suicide can be tied back to a Special Interest Bias. Extremely polarizing viewpoints between citizens and the government has left physician-assisted suicide in shambles for decades now, without any definitive answers being agreed upon. Those who are involved in the “Right to Die” movement only focus on legalizing PAS, and their main argument is that they should have the right to choose when they die. If one encounters themselves in a fatal and