Essay On Legalizing Physician Assisted Suicide

Physician Assisted Suicide Should Be Legalized Two thirds of out of 703 people believe if a patient is in a lot of pain, they should get the option of PAS (physician assisted suicide.) The diseases people have could threaten their lives, they could be on their deathbed with days to live. If someone knows they are dying and they are in extreme pain, they should get the choice to be killed by the physician if that is what they really want. Many people wonder when this really started becoming an issue, and what arguments people have for PAS. Depending on their disease, the medications they take, and the statistics of physician assisted suicide, a patient should be able to request PAS from a physician. Physician Assisted Suicide …show more content…
In Oregon PAS has been legalized. 14 out of 15 people got the drug in Oregon to kill them kindly, without any pain (Emanuel). It has been legalized in a few of the states (Grass). Many patients are requesting it more since it has become legalized across the nation. People tend to be half and half when it comes to legalizing physician assisted suicide. It tends to be a few more who are for legalizing it, than those who are against it. All in all, most people think of the pain someone is in, so they should be allowed to do whatever they please. Two thirds of 600 physicians think PAS is acceptable (Lee). Last year, one hundred and fifty six patients requested physician assisted suicide and thirty eight ended up dying from the physician (Lee). This tends to be very secretive because it is illegal in most places. The results of an interview that 80 patients took says, 79% were in pain, 53% had a loss of dignity, 52% had the fear that they would have symptoms that they would not be able to control, 50% were actually in pain, 47% thought that they had no meaning in life anymore, 34% thought that they were a burden to others, and 30% did not want to depend on others to take care of them (Backman). These results came to find out that patients that are actually struggling with the pain from their illness or from treatment, think that physician assisted suicide is unacceptable. Physicians have come to notice that a lot of requests obviously come from the patient, but there are also many others who request for the patient (Lee). Most of these people are close friends and family members. When physicians get these requests they don’t really know what to do. So 43% of the physicians who got asked for physician assisted suicide actually administered the proceedings themselves (Backman). 57% asked someone else to do it for them (Lee). The statistics of PAS prove to people how this is a very complicated issue