Should Assisted Suicide be Legalized for the Terminally Ill in All 50 States?

Introduction

People undergo hard situations with unending painful experiences that make them and their loved ones lose hope for life. People have become sickly with diseases that have no cure, and have to live with the stressful situation for the rest of their lives. Some diseases that have no cure for chronic neurologic diseases, vital cancer, and vital body injuries. A patient might undergo trouble and lack of hope to get well and opt to seek assistance to end their lives. The patient seeks for assisted suicide which involves a physician or another person offering the means of suicide to the hurting person.

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The assisting person knows the actions they take with the patient and intentionally help them kill themselves. Physicians might take the patient through the expectations and death experience the patient might undergo different lethal doses so as to help them through their decision. Assisted suicide is not accepted in all 50 states of the United States of America due to various reasons. This essay aims at supporting the statement that Assisted Suicide must get legalized for the terminally ill patients among all the 50 states of America.

Background

Assisted suicide is not among the best decision the family of the sickly would love to hear because letting go of a loved one is always the most difficult situation for anyone. Therefore, it is always a decision that the terminally sick person decides on their own, depending on the amount of pain they have to bear every day before their actual estimated time of death comes. Some patients might not have too much pain, but the though living under a short clock adds unimaginable stress to their lives which drives them to opt for suicide. No one has the right to decide on the life of a person, but in such extreme cases, the terminally sick can have the choice and the right to receive assisted suicide (Sulmasy & Paul, 576-578).

Few states allow for assisted suicide, but it is good to offer people the choice to decide on what they wish to do to their lives once they understand they-they don't have much time left to live. However, many religious norms believe and cultures don't support any form of suicide, which makes it wrong to advocate for assisted suicide. Many families are left behind blaming the doctor or the person who helped their loved ones through assisted suicide. They believe that the person could still have the chance to survive or somehow recover. Life is sacred and governmental laws allow for the right to life for everyone and hence protect everyone from anything that can deprive them of that right, even if it is themselves. Therefore, it has been hard to legalize assisted suicide to different beliefs, laws, and cultures among other conflicting reasons (Yang & Farr, 247-248).

Thesis Assertion

Yes, the 50 American states should allow assisted suicide. People need the freedom to decide on their lives in such critical times. Other people might not exactly understand what the sickly person undergoes every day, the pain they feel and the stress they endure due to their condition. Therefore, it is an act of mercy to give them a chance to decide on whether to terminate their lives or live through till the estimated time of death arrives as per the doctor's calculations (Nelson, 385-386).

Therefore, the 50 states of America should be allowed to perform assisted suicide freely as per the wished of the patient and the seriousness of their situation. Sometimes it is always better to assist the terminally ill to rest instead of having to watch them every day suffer without knowing how to help them. However, the patient has to undergo thorough psychological therapy to help them understand the weight of their decision, the expected outcomes, the different doses for the process, the preferable life termination method and the negative effects of the decision to their family members. The patient has to understand everything about their choice of suicide before the process is done (Nelson, 385-386).

Counter Argument

On the other hand, the families of the terminally ill always wish to spend the remaining period beside their sickly people, and many cannot accept to induce death on them and lose them sooner than expected. In some cases, the terminally ill might have the chance to recover due to new inventions and super improved technology. Other people uphold their faith in the supreme beings and begin to recover. There is always a chance that the situation of the people could change and become better. Besides, some of the terminally ill patients get too stressed, which magnifies the effects of their sicknesses, making them appear weaker than expected. Such situations push them to opt for assisted suicide when they might have led a better period before their actual time od death. Therefore, it is better if the law against assisted suicide gets upheld, to prevent such unnecessary immature deaths (Yang & Farr, 247-248).

It is always easier to offer patients with a suicide pill that to try and seek medical help in every way for their terminal illness. Many people have opted for the suicide pills due to the enormous amount of capital required to give a try to their illness because it's the cheaper option, which should not be the case because life is much more precious than money. Also, legalizing assisted suicide would make it easier for people to have it as an option due to the stress and pain experienced in the sickbed (Battin, 63-72).

Also, the records on assisted death are merely taken, which paves the way for people to cover up the abuse of power. Many specialists won't report an assisted suicide, and mostly no action gets taken against it. Besides, legalizing assisted suicide would never make it clear on the intentions of the doctor to the patients. Some doctors prefer to end life instead of advising them on all the possible available treatments despite their cost which is very unethical. People must be able to trust their doctors because anything they say or do can cost or save a life. Doctors must learn to get truthful to their patients especially when they might be in their last moments alive. (Battin, 63-72)

Refute for Counter Arguments

For decades, supporting someone to end their lives has been considered immoral and inhuman. However, recently people advocate for aid in dying for people diagnosed with untreatable diseases and with a short period left to live. Only five states have legalized assisted suicide. However, assisting dying people in conducting a faster, painless death is currently seen as an act of mercy, and not inhumanity. The right to live should get a measurable percentage to the beholder, to decide whether to keep it or lose it in such situations. Endless and incurable physical and mental suffering is far much worse than death, and hence such patients should get the right to assisted suicide (Quill, Anthony & Susan, 245-246).

The American laws state that no one should get forced to undergo suffering, which means that people with unbearable levels of pain due to terminal illness should have the chance to opt to end their lives with a physician's help. Moreover, people should readily accept the fact that everyone will eventually pass on, but for some death comes before their time in the most unbearable situations. People should always be ready to make hard decisions like assisted suicide. Sometimes there is just nothing more than anyone can do than let the sickly rest in peace. There is always a time to stop trying, which is part of humanity (Quill, Anthony & Susan, 245-246).

For instance, a person diagnosed with terminal brain cancer undergoes too much pain, becomes very weak and has no hope of getting better. It too becomes very hard for them to finish a single day with a smile. Such people deserve the chance to choose an earlier death instead of suffering every day knowing they await death in the end (Yang & Farr, 247-248).

Claims Towards Legalizing Assisted Suicide

Firstly, for all 50 states in the USA, assisted suicide should get legalized to allow people to make decisions in their lives when faced with terminal diseases. Dying is not a crime, especially when a sane person decides to die due to terminal diseases. Just as people have the right to life, they also possess the right to die, and no one should go against that especially when someone has already suffered enough under the claws of a disease. No one ever wishes to die, but some situations push people to have to make the difficult decision for their lives. The terminally ill can choose to live in pain and suffering or to let go of life and perform a prior assisted suicide. Also, it is not immoral to decide on an assisted suicide, because a person just runs out of options and their bodies only grow weaker with time (Nelson, 385-386).

Assisted suicide has worked for many terminal patients, with the bigger percentage consisting cancer patients. Within the years 1998-2015, 991 patients requested for assisted suicide and took it. They chose to leave behind the suffering and move on to the other face of life. Many of the patients attached the reasons of uncontrollable pain and inability to enjoy life as the main reasons for choosing to conduct suicide. Life is not life unless someone enjoys it and is comfortable living it. Pain and sadness deprive people of the meaning of life and when options to find them back run out, then many terminal illness patients would rather die. It is usually a bad time for the patient's families, but the patient accepted death and prepared their family to learn to accept such instances (Emanuel et al., 79-90).

Secondly, assisted suicide should be legal in the 50 states to allow people to practice free will in making personal life decisions as they uphold laws. Humanity is made up of many things, including the ability to have self-determination when faced with difficult situations that affect us. For instance, a terminal cancerous person with only 6 months of life can decide to sacrifice that remaining period, evade all the pain and avoid leaving their family bankrupt as they try to save a dying person by taking a suicide pill (Clarke, n.p).

It is a way that leaves no harm to other people. Everyone has a right to a good death, which should not get denied to the terminally sick. People should get the chance to prepare their families, say their last regards and then have the kind of death they prefer in their sickly conditions. It is better to die at home with family members and loved ones through an assisted suicide than to die at the hospital alone after long suffering. When people get the chance to decide a better way for them die, it is best to let them since they have barely any strength to continue with their current lives. (Jones & David, 599-604).

Some people in the states that have restricted assisted suicide end up putting themselves through circumstances will help them die faster without the death pills. For instance, Kelly Taylor starved herself intentionally for 19 days in the search for earlier death. Kelly ended up suffering further considering her situation and the hunger, which was unnecessary if she had access to assisted suicide. Kelly would have died a miserable death with no appreciation for life, but preparing her for an assisted would let her leave the world while still keeping her human dignity. A 29-year lady, Brittany Maynard, after struggling with cancer and finally getting the news that she had a few months left, she died after taking a death pill and rested at an earlier date. She had the free will to take that option, which should be allowed for every other person struggling with awaiting death due to a certain disease. Patients can actually have a say in how they die similar circumstances (Battin, Rhodes & Silvers, n.p).

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