Discussion thread - the right to choose life

[Bonny]

There are choices to be made. When you are terminally ill. Living wills can extend your life or end them. Both hospitals & rest homes have residents sign a paper saying they either want to be revived or left go. My mom signed a legal document while in a home not to be revived. They went over the consequences of being revived. It was a sad time. She contracted the flu & only lasted 5 days in the home after having a stroke. Really you just never know how it is going to end for you till it ends.

[Asiel]

Euthanasia gives physicians, who are only humans-the right to murder. Doctors are people who we trust to save and cure us, we regard them as the people who have been trained to save our lives but euthanasia gives doctors the opportunity to play God and most seize this opportunity. A perfect example of an opportunist would be Dr. Jack Kevorkian, better known as "Dr. Death" who took advantage of his patients' sorrows and tragedies and murdered them. In fact, Kevorkian has helped more than 100 people commit suicide and not all of his patients were terminally ill. In addition, in the late 1980s the lunatic created a machine for murder, it was a "suicide machine" that allowed a person by pressing a button, to dispense a lethal dose of medication to himself or herself. Later, Dr. Kevorkian was sentenced to ten to twenty-five years in prison for second-degree murder for providing lethal injection to a seriously ill patient. Dr. Jack Kevorkian, however, is not the only example of a doctor who tried to "play God".

There is a big difference to making a living will and asking not to be kept alive by machines..a No Ressuscitation makes sense and everyone should have a living will IMO. As for playing God and just deciding who should live and who should die that isn't up to us.
Many terminally ill patients choose to wait until their bodies give up on their own and I respect that also. What if Christopher Reeves had committed suicide instead of working till the end trying to find a cure for brain and spine injuries? And what about Terry Fox? Was that all in vain? Those are the people I admire and respect..they can accept the good with the bad and help others regardless of their own suffering. To me thar's a life worth living.

[Cataholic]

As Asiel points out, there is a huge difference with a "living will" (an oxymoron if there ever was) and euthanizing a person. A Health Care Power of Attorney or a "Living Will" allow someone other than the patient to make decisions otherwise left to the patient, but due to some reason, that person can't make the decision.

Where Asiel and I split off though, is the euthanizing aspect of the disucssion. If a person (not a doctor, not a wife...the actual person) wants to end their life, they should be permitted to do so. I think the person should be permitted to do so regardless of the validity of the reasons they might have. But, certainly, when faced with a devasting, incurable, finacially draining, and probably painful process, the person should be permitted to end the suffering. And, the doctor or person that faciliates (carries out) the patients wishes should be immune from liability.

[Marigold2]

I know your pain, I do......
To have to stand next to the person you love most on this earth, who loves you the most and watch them die...............
It is a pain so deep so all consuming.......
To let them suffer and continue is a living hell.............
I love my children too much to let them go through this......

There are choices to be made. When you are terminally ill. Living wills can extend your life or end them. Both hospitals & rest homes have residents sign a paper saying they either want to be revived or left go. My mom signed a legal document while in a home not to be revived. They went over the consequences of being revived. It was a sad time. She contracted the flu & only lasted 5 days in the home after having a stroke. Really you just never know how it is going to end for you till it ends.

[cassiesmom]

I saw a piece on the news, I think it was on "60 Minutes" about the high number of older adults who receive care in the ICU that really doesn't prolong or improve their quality of life. There were several reasons for this including- that young doctors aren't given a lot of training on how to have end-of-life discussions; that sometimes the ICU doctor doesn't know the patient very well and might not be familiar with their wishes; that there is a mindset in American medicine that everything must be done/tested/evaluated in case the patient/family later take legal action. If I'm ever in that situation don't prolong my life, but don't deliberately end it either.