Two 1 Student Two Professor Stanko English 102 30 July 2013 Physician Assisted Suicide Doctor assisted suicide

is a very controversial topic in our world today. This does not only affect the patient but also the family. As we live our lives with the ones we love we grow a very strong bond and when they get sick it is very hard for everyone to deal with. The family would have to live with knowing that someone gave their loved one medicine to kill themselves and will have no consequences for it if this becomes legalized. Four states in America have already legalized the practice of doctor assisted suicide. In the article Doctors: Speak Out Against Suicide Protects Patients, Author Brian Cunningham states discusses the issue of doctor assisted suicide and how it is wrong. Not only is it morally wrong but once legalized there will be many changes to health care for everyone. Doctor assisted suicide will become more common because it is cheaper than treatment so insurance will cover it but not treatment. According to Cunningham, this has already happened. he states in his article that " a 53 year-old in Oregon without health insurance with advanced prostate cancer who received a letter stating that the state would pay for physician-assisted suicide but not for the costly treatment of his cancer"(Cunningham).This man has a possible deadly disease if not treated but the insurance refuses to pay for treatment. Because he lives in Oregon this is his option and if they legalize doctor assisted suicide then this will be the new normal and it well affect everyone.

Two 2 In the article Physician-Assisted Suicide the option of not using this method is talked about. How it is now being referred to makes it sound okay and like it is not suicide or ones doctor is not using drugs to make them die. Referring to physician-assisted suicide as treatment is a new rhetorical tool that is used by the advocates of euthanasia.(PhysicianAssisted Suicide). The fact of the matter is that no matter what you call it is still wrong. Calling it a treatment is not right but it is being done to make what is happening sound better to the public. The article Physician-Assisted Suicide states that the goal is to make assisted suicide seem less alarming to the public and to promote the idea that legalizing the practice is just another small step along a path already taken and ethically approved. No matter how it is put the public should be alarmed because people are still dying from this. Doctors should not be allowed to give a person lethal amounts of drugs to end their lives. Doctors are supposed to help and heal patients not kill them. Cunningham states as physicians, we took an oath to strive, to the best of our abilities, to help patients and to make every reasonable effort to do no harm. Physician-assisted suicide is incompatible with that goal, and is the means to an end that we have no right to employ. If doctors take an oath to do no harm than how is killing or helping patients kill themselves doing no harm. Doctors have no right to give someone a way to kill themselves. To make this legal is like saying it is okay to give a mentally unstable person a gun. As stated in the article Physician-Assisted Suicide permitting physician-assisted suicide creates a slippery slope that unavoidably leads to expanded access to assisted suicide interventions and abuses. If this option is given to one person then it is given to everyone, people who have no reason to die can because of this. This is an unavoidable consequence which needs to be considered. If one person has the option then everyone will have to option, it cannot be determined who deserves this option and who doesnt.

Two 3 When this becomes legal there will be no way to stop it. Many people will consider this as a treatment option and many people who could have been helped will die. Many depressed people will use physician assisted suicide to end their lives because it is legal and easy to do. The fact is once this is legalized there will be no way to control it. Because it also costs less than treatment insurance companies will consider this a treatment and only pay for this and not real treatment. Instead of getting help people will be told that this is the only option insurance will pay for. Calling it a treatment does not cover up what it really is. It is suicide and a doctor is helping a person commit it. Because it is being called a treatment people are less aware of what is happening. Just to make it so people are less afraid of what it really is and what is really being legalized, is being called a treatment. This is important because it is the matter of life and death. Doctors are supposed to be helping patients not harming them. The fact that they are giving lethal doses of drugs to patients is harming them. Once this starts it will never stop, this thing they are calling treatment will become normal. People that could be helped and even saved could end up dead because of this. It does not only affect the patient but their families as well. This new system will be abused and there will be no way to avoid that. All in all this is a bad idea and it is morally wrong. There will be no way to avoid abuse of this system and there is no turning back. Insurance will change forever because this new method is cheaper. People will no longer be able to afford the treatment they deserve. This does not only affect the patient but also their families. Doctors are supposed to help and not harm the patients which will no longer be the case if Physician-Assisted Suicide is legalized.

Two 4 Work cited Cunningham, Brian. Doctors: Speak Out Against Assisted Suicide, Protect Patients. Life News. 13 Dec. 2011. Web. 17 Aug. 2013. Physician-Assisted Suicide. New England Journal of Medicine. 11 April. 2013. Web. 24 April. 2013.