In Hippocratic Oath, Hippocrates as a father of medicine swears, “I will not give a lethal drug to anyone if I am asked, nor will I advise such a plan” (National Library of Medicine, p. 6). In other words, Hippocrates was against euthanasia. According to the Dictionary. com the definition of euthanasia is “the act of putting to death painlessly or allowing to die, as by withholding extreme medical measures, a person or animal suffering from an incurable, especially painful, disease or condition” (Dictionary. com, p. 1).
It is also called a mercy killing, some people think that this is a good decision and some don’t. I personally, believe that this is not right; an individual should go into the afterlife naturally. 1. On one side there are people that justify this act as helping a terminally ill individual end his/her sufferings. For example, when an individual was in a house fire and burnt sixty percent of his skin and is going to die but he chooses euthanasia in order to stop the pain. In that case he will die eventually and there are many painkillers that can soothe his pain and help him spend more time with his family.
Another case is when a person has been in vegetative state for a long time and eventually the relatives decide to turn the machines off and let the individual die. This is a very sensitive case because if a person didn’t want to die but didn’t have a living will, legally their spouse can pull the plugs off even if the person’s parents would be against it. And let’s not forget that technically if a brain shows a minimum of activity, the person is still considered alive. I consider turning off the machine is same as giving up on a person. 2.
On the other side, there are people that are against it, including me, I consider it as manslaughter, even though an ill person is agreed to die. It is also against my religion, all humans are made in God’s image and God gave us life so we should respect it. At this moment, euthanasia is illegal in every state in the U. S. , not counting two states like Oregon and Washington. In Oregon they have an act called Oregon Death with Dignity Act and in Washington State they have the same act, except it is called the Washington Death with Dignity Act.
(Wikipedia, p. 19). I am against legalizing euthanasia because there are some people that are not in sound mind, they may have suicidal thoughts and they will ask their doctor or people around them to help them stop their pain. If euthanasia will be legal some people will be forced to sign their consent to death, when he/she doesn’t know what he/she is signing; for example, a man in a nursing home that cannot read, or hear anymore is asked to sign the consent to his death, he will do it because he will trust people around him, people that take care of him.
He will go along the process because he wouldn’t even understand what is going on. The reason why people would do that is when they are tired of him or they spend too much money on him so they will try get rid of him, I know it sounds awful but you will be surprised what people are capable of doing because of the money. Also, like I mentioned before, euthanasia is against Hippocratic Oath that every doctor takes before they get their license, in other words, it is against doctor’s moral responsibilities.
When we think about euthanasia being legal in every state there would be many horrible cases that we cannot even think of. 3. You probably have a question on where it started. Well according to the History. com Adolf Hitler came up with this idea (History. com, p. 1). He ordered to kill all handicapped and mentally ill children. In addition, after that he moved on to adults and senior population. Hitler called it mercy killing because supposedly he was helping people to get out of their “misery” but it was a way of saving money.
I believe that euthanasia is not right, no matter from what angles you look at it, it is manslaughter and as a human being I would not follow Hitler’s way of dealing with sick and dependant people. We should respect life that was given to us by God and end it in a natural way because this is how we were made.
Reference Page North, Michael. “Greek Medicine | Hippocrates | The Oath. ” National Library of Medicine – National Institutes of Health. 24 June 2010. Web. 14 Nov. 2011. <http://www. nlm. nih. gov/hmd/greek/greek_oath. html> “Euthanasia | Define Euthanasia at Dictionary.
com. ” Dictionary. com | Find the Meanings and Definitions of Words at Dictionary. com. Web. 14 Nov. 2011. <http://dictionary. reference. com/browse/euthanasia>. “Hitler Suspends Euthanasia Program — History. com This Day in History — 8/18/1941. “History. com — History Made Every Day — American & World History. A&E Television Network. Web. 14 Nov. 2011. <http://www. history. com/this-day-in-history/hitler-suspends-euthanasia-program>. “Suicide Legislation. ” Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. 4 Nov. 2011. Web. 14 Nov. 2011. <http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Suicide_legislation>.