3. HEAR SOME ARGUMENTS AGAINST PHYSICIAN-ASSISTED SUICIDE

"Physician-assisted suicide is not a suitable replacement for proper medical care."

The Argument: Patient suffering is unnecessary given the sophistication of modern drugs. Physician-assisted suicide is really just a cheap and easy way of getting around the real problem, which is that many patients receive poor medical care and support. A competent, caring doctor is always able to relieve the pain associated with terminal disease, so there is really no need for any kind of suicide. Our attention should be focused on ensuring that everyone receives high-quality treatment rather than on legalizing the killing of suffering patients.

The Response: Suffering is not just a matter of pain. Even if it were true that doctors are always able to relieve pain - which is arguable - there remains the mental anguish and loss of quality of life. Patients who took advantage of Oregon's Death with Dignity Act most commonly reported that they were concerned about loss of autonomy and loss of ability to participate in activities that make life enjoyable. These are legitimate, rational concerns under the circumstances and not indications of mental illness. There are also gray areas between physical and mental pain, such as difficulty in swallowing and in breathing. It should not be the place of anyone other than the patient himself to determine what constitutes intolerable suffering.

"Suicide is morally wrong, and certainly should not be facilitated. Those who aid in such conduct (i.e., murderers) should be brought to justice, rather than encouraged."

The Argument: Suicide is a violation of divine law. America is a Christian nation and almost all Christian churches (as well as other faiths) forbid the practice of suicide as fundamentally immoral. Your life is not your own, but a gift given to you in trust by God. You have no right to take your own life before your natural time. And as for taking someone else's life, do the words "Thou shall not kill" ring a bell, by any chance?

The Response:There is a separation of Church and State in America, and no citizen has the right to impose his religious moral values on any other citizen. If you believe it's wrong to commit suicide or to assist in a suicide, even in the case of terminally ill patients, you can choose not to participate in PAS, but you cannot make that choice for anyone else.

"Physician-assisted suicide discriminates against the disabled."

The Argument: A national organization of people with disabilities called "Not Yet Dead" was involved in the Supreme Court case, Quill v. Vacco (1997),which upheld the constitutional right of states to ban assisted suicide. This group argued that people with significant health problems are singled out and denied "equal protection of laws and medical practice standards automatically applied to healthy persons who are suicidal". Terminally ill patients wanting to die should be treated just as a suicidal teenager would be treated. Helping them to die just because they are infirm is discriminatory.

The Response: The desire to end your life when you're suffering terribly, and have every reason to believe that you will continue to suffer up until the moment of your inevitable death, cannot be compared to the suicidal tendencies of people in less critical circumstances. We're not talking about getting rid of the disabled. We are talking about giving terminally ill patients, who are suffering and have no chance of recovery, and who want to die, the option of taking control over what will happen to them in a humane and dignified manner. Alarmists claimed that Oregon would become the Suicide State, but in fact only 15 people in 1998, and 27 people in 1999, availed themselves of PAS out of a total of 29,000 deaths each year. This supports the view that PAS is not a general threat to the community, but a rare and extraordinary event justified by extreme circumstances.


List of PAS Links: http://www.lwc.edu/administrative/library/suic.htm
National Public Radio Debate (RealPlayer) http://justicetalking.org/media/jtsuicide.ram