Kimberly Rogers AP English: Final Draft 3/28/11

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On My Own Will: For Assisted Suicide When a being of mankind who is in excruciating pain and is on the brink of death, should he have the right to say that he does not want to endure it no longer? Should he be allowed to pull his own plug? Assisted Suicide is a branch of voluntary euthanasia. It is accepted in some areas of the world while other areas are revolted by it. Why are the minds of people debating the ethics of this matter? Could it be that nobody knows what it is or what the guidelines for such an act, or is because they think its a way for doctors to just kill someone? What is assisted suicide? In assisted suicide someone provides an individual with the means of committing suicide. The one performing the suicide is the one who has the intention to die. If the person who is going to die did not give the consent to their death then the act is just of a crude form of euthanasia. Some people often confuse crude euthanasia with the term assisted suicide. Someone might call a gang shooting a method of euthanasia. That is only true because the intention of death is present; it is not the victims choice in that case to be murdered. But if someone is to ask for a happy ending of life --with the dignity that they have a right to-- then they should be given the chance to do so. But it must be lawful.

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There is a lawful way of performing an assisted suicide. According to the clinic in Switzerland, Digintas, many levels of examination are taken before granted the right to die in their facility. A client should first be seen by a physician and haven a proven fatal illness. If not they are immediately turned down. After that they must be sure they are sound of mind. If the Dignitas employee has received confirmation then a consultation will be allowed. A date is set for the death by which the client has chosen. The client may arrange the whole event of the death. What they are wearing, what they are listening to, who is near them, and the last words they speak. On the day of the event, after given the tools or medicine, before it is administered to the body, the person can choose to back out of the operation. In some areas of the world physicians are allowed to assist in the act of euthanasia, while others cant because they are bound by the Hippocratic Oath: I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest any such counsel. The survey from the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) found
that only 22 percent of cancer doctors support assisted suicide in terminally-ill patients compared to 45 percent in a similar study three years ago. Support for euthanasia was just 6.5 percent down from 22 percent in the previous report. ASCO surveyed 3,200 oncologists for the report. (1) That survey was taken somewhere between 1995 to 1998.

Most assisted suicide cases are a way of relieving pain. It is also a way of relieving a financial burden to the families that are left behind since they are the ones pre-paying and planning their deaths. Some people say that

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some people will try to force their older family members to go through with it so that they can receive their fortune. But that in its self is an unethical act. Not only that but, a person must be of sound mind and already have an existing health condition. If the doctor does not say there is a medical reason for exiting life then the procedure will no longer continue. If pain is the case then it is proper of the person to consult a doctor if a more adequate pain relief system is available. John Elliott is a man who has gone through with assisted suicide. He was dying of Multiple Myeloma. Multiple Myeloma is a bone marrow cancer and as it would progress in Dr. Elliotts body he would endure horrible pain and would have to suffer. Not only that but he would lose his motor skills and would then become a burden on his wife Angelika. He did not want to become that so he contacted Dignitas and at 9am on Thursday 25, January 2007 he had ended his life. He drank a lethal drug called Nembutal. He did so so he could die happy and with dignity. If you were diagnosed with a terminal illness such as cancer would you continue to live? So what if the cancer had taken over your body and your body was in an agonizing and you were already using the highest dosage of the strongest pain relief, would you still want to live? Would you still want to burden your family with the nights you wake up screaming or the nights you vomiting uncontrollably? Would you want you leave them no time to be ready for your death? Are you ready for the inevitable?

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