John Stuart Mill's Arguments For Assisted Suicide

Assisted suicide is also known as physician-assisted suicide because the physician assists the patient. Assisted suicide is suicide committed by a patient who is suffering from a disease, by taking the lethal drugs provided by a doctor for the purpose of committing suicide. When assisted suicide takes place it is the patient who ends his/her life not the physician. Before assisted suicide a physician provides an individual with information, guidance and means to take his or her own life with the intention that they be used for this purpose. Assisted suicide and euthanasia are different due do a big factor of what happens during them.

Physician assisted suicide is the termination of a life by the administration of lethal substances with the help of a doctor or physician. The legality and morality of physician assisted suicide is in a constant debate. Some claim that it is merciful to the terminally ill. Others claim that it is no better than murder. Despite its advocates, physician assisted suicide is morally and ethically wrong and impractical therefore it should remain illegal in the United States.

Assisted suicide is defined as a physician providing a patient the means to take his or her own life, usually through medicine. Washington, Vermont, Montana, and New Mexico has passed the laws to have the right to die with dignity. Those states based their decision on the fact that it minimizes the pressure to cut health costs. It has been stated assisted suicide is the cheapest thing that a person with an illness can do. These states claim that this law will help to prevent abuse. The bill allows physicians to prescribe medication to terminally ill patients who want to speed up the process to dying.

Assisted suicide is when you give someone else permission like a physician, to kill you. Assisted suicide is legal in at least six states (Tolle, 1996) and there is lots of people who wanted to die because the disease they might have at the moment is just too much for them. If a patient that wanted to die the they would either talk to a physician or their doctor and give the doctor permission to just kill the patient. Assisted suicide can only happen when your medication is not working and the pain from the sickness you have is just abdominale. There was a case that was about how a man who was going through chemotherapy he didn't want to go through it so he talked to his doctor about assisted suicide. They decided to

Assisted suicide is the suicide of a terminally- ill patient, achieved by using a prescribed drug from a doctor for that specific purpose. It is legal in only six states in the United States of America including: Oregon, Montana, Washington, Colorado, Vermont, and California. Countries such as Germany, Japan, and Switzerland have legalized assisted suicide in past years. It has been disputed for many years and continues to be a controversial issue whether physicians should be authorized to end an individual’s life with their prescription and if this should be done legally.

Many people throughout the world are diagnosed with a terminally ill disease, meaning their disease is not curable and they are given a short period to live. Take Brittany Maynard for example. She was diagnosed with brain cancer at the age of 29 and had two surgeries to prevent the tumor from growing. Months later she found out her tumor came back, was more aggressive, and she was given six months to live. Doctors suggested another surgery, but after reading the side effects, Brittany decided not to do it. She considered staying at her home in San Francisco under hospice care. With not wanting her family to watch her suffer, she looked into the Death with Dignity Act. This act is adopted in only five states and gives patients who are terminally ill the right to die with the use of a prescribed drug from a doctor. Here in Wisconsin, there is no Death with Dignity Law. According to John Stuart Mill, author of “On Liberty”, this assisted suicide act should be legal in all states. In his work, he talks about his own principles. Certain principles that tie into assisted suicide are direct and indirect harm followed by informed consent. In “On Liberty” Mill’s principles say assisted suicide should be legal in all states since it only causes direct harm to the person taking the pill and indirect harm to loved ones.

To fully understand the issue at hand, one must understand the various forms of euthanasia. The Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary: Tenth Edition defines euthanasia as “the act or practice of killing or permitting the death of hopelessly sick or injured individuals…in a relatively painless way for reasons of mercy.” Euthanasia can be either passive or active. Passive euthanasia occurs when a patient is relieved of medical treatment and is allowed to die naturally. Active euthanasia occurs when either a physician or a family member actively takes the life of the patient, perhaps through lethal injection, and eliminates a natural death process. Many people commonly use the word “euthanasia” to refer to assisted suicide. Essentially, assisted suicide is a form of active euthanasia in that a person, usually a physician, aids in the suicide of a patient.

The topic of assisted suicide was almost never broached simply because it was always considered a touchy subject, that all changed last year. Medically assisted suicide is the act of a terminally ill patient deciding to withdraw all forms of medical treatment to ingest a lethal dose of prescribed medication. As of October 5,2015 California is only one of six states that offer medically assisted suicide. The additional five states include; Oregon, Washington, Montana, Vermont, and New Mexico. Physician assisted suicide rightfully provides terminally-ill patients with the choice to end their life should they meet all requirements and be in the right state of mind at the time of their request.

According to the Oxford Dictionary, assisted suicide is “...suicide effected with the assistance of another person, especially the taking of lethal drugs provided by a doctor for the purpose by a patient suffering from a terminal illness or incurable condition.” Assisted suicide for the terminally ill should be legalized in all fifty states, considering it gives the person control over their life, ends their family’s suffering and assures that the patient will have access over their unalienable rights.

Physician-assisted suicide is when a terminally ill patient requested a physician to facilitate the patient death by providing the necessary lethal dose of a drug which enables the patient to perform the life-ending act. Provided that, Physician assisted suicide has been part of the debate about improving end-of-life care for terminally ill patients for decades. As a result, physician assisted suicide may be viewed morally wrong by some people, but morally permissible by another.

Assisted suicide is defined as the aiding and abetting in a person’s suicide to relieve them from suffering. It is also known as Euthanasia. Euthanasia or assisted suicide has been going on for probably as long as there has been

Physician-assisted suicide is a form of assisted suicide in the United States, in which the physicians prescribe lethal doses of drugs or explaining a method of suicide to the patients upon the request of the patients. Physician-assisted suicide is different from the active euthanasia, which refers to competent patients voluntarily agree to euthanasia through communicating their wishes when they are competent or through instructions to be followed if they become incompetent because the final act of killing is performed by the patients, rather than the physicians in the active euthanasia. To date, physician-assisted suicide is only legal in eight states, including California, Colorado, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Montana, Oregon, Vermont and

After researching assisted suicide I have more questions than when I started. The definition of assisted suicide is very factual: suicide facilitated by another person, especially a physician, who organized the logistics of the suicide, as by providing the necessary quantities of a poison (The definition of assisted suicide 2016). After much research I have learned that assisted suicide is an option one has to make depending on their moral standards, will to live, and how they want to die rather than a factual process one can follow.

The Merriam Webster dictionary defines assisted suicide (AS) as follows: suicide with help from another person (such as a doctor) to end suffering from severe physical illness. As of 2014 four states in the USA have already legalized assisted suicide. Those states are as follows: Oregon legalized on November 8, 1994, Washington legalized on November 4, 2008, Montana December 31, 2009, and Vermont May 20, 2013 (“State-by-State Guide to Physician-Assisted Suicide - Euthanasia - ProCon.org,” n.d.). These four states are proof that assisted suicide can be legalized without the fears of the naysayers coming to life. Other states can also learn how to improve legalizing assisted suicide in their state from the states that have already legalized

Assisted Suicide, Euthanasia, Aid in Dying or Dying with Dignity are all terms found on various web site that are related to intentionally providing a person with the knowledge or access to commit suicide. In the United States, Oregon, Washington and Vermont have Assisted Suicide laws for the terminally ill. There are strict guidelines to apply for the right to die with dignity. Under the law, requests are made by the patient to the doctor