Ethical Arguments
Euthanasia gives out a bad message
Some people fear that allowing euthanasia sends the message, "it's better to be dead than sick or disabled". It is basically saying that some lives are not worth living. This is downgrading the status of the disabled and the sick. Part of the problem is that able-bodied people look at things from their own perspective and see life with a disability as a disaster, filled with suffering and frustration. Some societies have regarded people with disabilities as second-rate, or as a burden on society.
Euthanasia affects people’s rights. Euthanasia affects the person who wants to die, but it also affects other people too. (E.g. family and friends) There rights should also be considered. The fear is that if euthanasia is allowed, vulnerable people will be put under pressure to end their lives. It would be difficult, and perhaps impossible, to stop people using persuasion to get people to request euthanasia when they don't really want it. Family or others involved with the sick person may regard them as a burden that they don't wish to carry, and may put pressure on the sick person to ask for euthanasia. There are an increasing numbers of examples of the neglect of elderly people by their families. This makes it an important issue to consider.
The last few months of a patient's life are often the most expensive in medical and other care. Shortening this period through euthanasia could be seen as a way to reduce finances for families . The cost of the lethal medication required for euthanasia is less than £50, which is much cheaper than continuing treatment for many medical conditions.
The patient might not want euthanasia
A serious problem for supporters of euthanasia are the number of cases in which a patient may ask for euthanasia, or feel obliged to ask for it, when it isn't in their best interest.
- The diagnosis is wrong and the patient is not terminally ill.
- The prognosis (the doctor's prediction as to how the disease will progress) is wrong and the patient is not going to die soon.
- The patient is getting bad medical care and their suffering could be relieved by other means.
- The patient's request for euthanasia is actually a 'cry for help'.
- The patient is depressed and so believes things are much worse than they are.
- The patient is confused and unable to make sensible judgements
- The patient has an unrealistic fear of the pain that lies ahead
- The patient is feeling vulnerable
- The patient feels that they are a worthless burden on others
- The patient feels that their sickness is causing unbearable grief to their family
- The patient is under pressure from other people to feel that they are a burden.
- The patient is under pressure because of a shortage of resources to care for them.
The Doctor patient relationship is weakened
When killing is involved in the medical profession, the doctor-patient relationship is ruined. People trust their lives to doctors and health care workers as they think that they are dedicated to the saving lives, to healing, and to caring.
But, the patient is not the only one at risk. Doctors too might start thinking taking a person’s life as a typical procedure.
There is also the problem of wrong diagnosis and predictions. To end a patient's life, a doctor must have fairly good guarantee of his prognosis. But surveys have found that a half of doctors said they were not confident to predict that a patient had less than six months to live.
Many cases or studies found that people were diagnosed with a disease, but they were really misdiagnosed and never had the disease at all!
A Right to die implies a desire to kill!
If society legalizes euthanasia the right to die will eventually result in a duty to kill.
Without the legalization of euthanasia staying people would be able to live, without having to justify his/her existence. With legalised euthanasia, there will be pressure upon people to justify being alive - we will have to prove if we ought to be allowed to live! This is unacceptable but could be likely to happen.
Practical arguments
Euthanasia cannot always be regulated properly
Those in favour of euthanasia think that there is no reason why euthanasia can't be controlled by proper regulation, but even they fear that regulations won't deal with people who want to put into action euthanasia for bad reasons.
People worry that whatever regulations are put into place they won't stop. Vulnerable patients would be pressured to choose death when they would rather live for a few more weeks.
Euthanasia will be abused
Allowing euthanasia will lead to a reduction of health care to terminally ill people. Health care workers might find this an easy way out, or a way to save money. Euthanasia could also be used as a cost-effective way to deal with terminally ill people. It would also discourage the search for new cures aand treatments for the terminally ill.
Doctors would have too much power
‘Doctors should not be able to play the role of God.’ Doctors should not be the people who decide when you die. No matter how strictly regulated, euthanasia puts doctors in an unacceptable position of power. Doctors have been known to not follow these decisions, and disobey the British Medical Association, the Resuscitation Council (UK), and the Royal College of Nursing.
Palliative Care
Palliative care is one of the most ignored issues in the whole debate. The terminally ill want pain relief, not an end to life. In America there are 31,000 annual suicides, of which only 2 to 4 per cent are by people who are terminally ill. Palliative care is fairly new, but has been increasingly used in the recent years. Yet it still hasn’t been used to its full extent.
In most cases palliative care can be used to relieve or stop suffering.
Finally, if euthanasia becomes legal and accepted by the community, there will less interest in palliative care and the care of the elderly.
Conclusion
For these and other reasons, euthanasia, or assisted-killing, should never be legalised. Instead, more effort should be put into reducing pain, not killing the sufferer.
Euthanasia spoils lives and rights, but encourages killing!
