Physician Assisted Suicide Should Be Legal Under Certain...

Physician-Assisted Suicide should be legal under certain circumstances Kayanna Johnson Florida State University College of Medicine, Tallahassee, Florida, USA The purpose of this paper is examine the use of Physician-Assisted Suicide (PAS) in certain patients in a bid to support its legalization in all states. In this paper I will argue that the use of PAS in patients who are terminally ill, in non-terminally ill patients who undergo intolerable pain, or in patients who are terminally or non-terminally ill who fear a loss of dignity and control over their body in the end stages of life is permissible. I will first define PAS and VAE and attempt to characterize suicide. I will then concentrate on the different historical views of PAS over†¦show more content†¦It is these same increases that have generated a fear for unnecessarily prolonged, costly, painful, and, undignified deaths. The fear of this unnecessarily long process has led to the increase in calls for legalization of PAS from patients who are not willing to undergo such a process. With PAS being illegal in most states and the recent shift in medicine to a focus on patient autonomy the question must be asked, â€Å"Should PAS be legalized?† The opponents of PAS make many interesting points, some of which will be discussed, but I will propose arguments to these objections in order to show that PAS should be legalized in certain situations. Definition of PAS and VAE PAS is the physician’s act of providing a patient with the medical means necessary for suicide (Bernat, Gert, and Mogielnicki, 1993). PAS requires for the physician to assent to a competent patient’s rational request for the necessary medical means for committing suicide. In this case, death is not caused directly by the physician’s actions, but rather indirectly. Therefore, a suicide is termed PAS if the physician’s participation is necessary but insufficient for death. VAE is when the physician agrees to a competent patient’s rational request for the physician to administer the necessary medical means to cause death which usually follows immediately after the act. In VAE, the physician is directly causing death, therefore, is killing the patient. Since a death by VAE is a direct result of the