Why Euthanasia Is Unethical - Case Study Example

Euthanasia affiliation Euthanasia Is Unethical Respecting life is one of the major responsibilities accorded to all humans; any effort to jeopardize this plan is often castigated and punishable. Euthanasia is not any different from any other form of killing because all types combined together life is lost at the end, several reasons exist to justify why euthanasia should not be practiced. Euthanasia is surrounded by coercion, procedural errors, a conflict of personal interest and legal dilemma in its execution. Furthermore, today many diseases are treatable due to medical and technological advancement. Encouraging euthanasia will cultivate the culture of complacence, negligence and increase in deaths from treatable conditions. Culturally, it is perceived as punishable by deities to take away life, a practice that can trigger conflicts in the family and society at larger. Why Euthanasia is Unethical Today, people can live longer than before due to current advancements in the medical field. Terminal Diseases such as cancer and degenerative disorders are now sufficiently managed through improved palliative care and advanced options of treatment. However, living longer must go hand in hand with quality of life failure to which an individual suffers pain and depression to the extent that life becomes uninteresting and meaningless. It is because of the uncertainties of illnesses that euthanasia has found its way into the medical practice. Most people who support mercy killing argue that it is a sure way of relieving pain and suffering while helping someone into a peaceful death (Emanuel, Fairclough, & Emanuel, 2000),however this in not enough to justify its practice. Considering several aspects and circumstances surrounding this practice, it is evident that the demerits out-weigh the merits right away from the reason for euthanasia, the procedures involved, the professional ethics, spiritual beliefs, and varied individual opinions. It remains undisputed that life must be protected and death is not supposed to be initiated regardless of the patient’s condition, rather end of life must be a natural course when all medical interventions have proved ineffective. It is for this reason that euthanasia must be avoided by all means, leaving death to be an inevitable natural phenomenon of life. Respect to human life is one of the prime human rights that attract other rights; it is a supreme requirement for each society to protect life beginning from conception up to old age having in mind the importance of life. Different societies have vividly defined circumstances in which life can be taken for example a capital crime or during war. In this case, euthanasia is considered disrespect to human life and therefore violation of human rights. This means that people are not supposed to give up on life even though the situation they face is pathetic and demeaning.it is for the reason that is euthanasia perceived as an act of hopelessness and lack of confidence in life, which is highly discouraged in the effort to protect life. With the emergence of euthanasia, there is an increased probability of coercion and compromised autonomy. When the public populations realize that euthanasia is unrestricted, they may engage into intentional acts of assault on individual’s freedom of choice and decision-making. When an individual recognizes how unproductive he or she is family wise or career wise occasioned by the medical condition, he or she may be subjected to pressure to ask for euthanasia even in a condition that is curable. The guilt of being a burden to the family and the feeling of worthlessness is common for those ill people especially those with psychological problems, this can increase loss of life if euthanasia is largely practiced and unrestricted by certain criteria that legalize it. This practice may be included in the options offered to the patient and the medical practitioners may enforce it against their own wishes and judgments (Van Alphen, Donker, & Marquet, 2010). In most cases, illness brings with it various psychological imbalances, compromised thinking, and poor decision-making. Not aware of these limitations, the patient can request for euthanasia just because he or she is dismayed, depressed, with a lot of pain, or dysphoric. Normally these symptoms can be well managed through pharmacological and psychological treatment not requiring ending life unnecessarily. Now it is evident that unless euthanasia is highly prohibited, we can lose life on reasons that are so shameful and demeaning and most of all in conditions that are treatable. Medical practioners as well as the population have to disregard euthanasia by all means and resort to using life preserving methods to deal with the terminal illnesses (Smets, Bilsen, Cohen, Rurup, Mortier, et al., 2010). The conflict of interest can ensue when both the carer and the patient have different opinions regarding life and illness. In most cases, the sick person may vest the power of decision-making and protection into his or her caregiver on realizing that he or she may not be able to decide thereafter due to the medical condition for example dementia or Alzheimer. However, when the caregiver assumes such responsibilities, it may be easier to decide when or whether the sick person should die. This can be highly fuelled especially when the caregiver is likely to benefit after the helpless person dies. Therefore, it can be easier for the caregiver to call for euthanasia to take full control of wealth and independence; this is contrary to what the sick person may wish for. In this case, the sick person can face death not because he wished for it but because he was unable to express his interests that someone else in the name of the caregiver did. Considering the legal aspects, euthanasia is hard to enforce and monitor, this is especially a problem in determining the cause and justification of any death. For instance, it may be difficult to ascertain whether death came as a natural event or it was due to medical malpractice in the hospital. Sometimes death can occur after incorrectly performed medical procedures on a terminally ill patient then covered up with euthanasia just because there is no proof for the error. This can help explain why some deaths of terminally ill patients are mysterious and unexplained, though autopsies may be used as proof, but in most cases deaths are unclear. This positions euthanasia as a cover up act for medical errors and it may not serve its rightful purpose when it is being practiced on a twisted path. With this kind of medical outcomes euthanasia must not be practiced in medical institution and society (Smets, Bilsen, Cohen, Rurup, & Deliens, 2010). Euthanasia is surrounded by several technical elements that try to explain why it should not be embraced and promoted as a routine practice. There have been incidents when the preferred method of euthanasia failed to bring about a comfortable death, but instead caused more agony and discomfort to the patient through prolongation of time of death (Van Alphen et al., 2010). In another case, the same method of euthanasia used in different patients can produce varied results that often do not meet the desired goal. Errors in diagnostic procedures and medical advances are also part of technical issues in euthanasia. During medical diagnosis, it is not always guaranteed that the method used will give accurate results; with the rapid epidemiological changes, misdiagnosis is a common error today and this may lead to inappropriate call for euthanasia. New medical discoveries in effective drugs and treatment techniques have helped in reversing conditions that were initially regarded as terminal, to practice euthanasia may infringe on people’s right of continuation of life. Unrestricted practice of euthanasia is likely to hinder the efforts to better diagnosis, treatment, care, and knowledge of terminally ill patients and other related conditions. For instance, if the terminally ill patients keep on advocating for euthanasia, this may shun off research funding, limit construction of caring facilities, reduce training of carers and discourage support systems. Following closely, economic factors may prompt and motivate the relevant authorities to sing in support for euthanasia. However, this should not be the case, as many patients with critical but treatable conditions will face death against their bidding. This is why euthanasia must be avoided since its effects are more devastating affecting multiple health care systems. The amalgamation of palliative care services with modern medical services makes euthanasia of no use in helping patients to control pain and enhance quality of life. Palliative care does not just focus on the physiological aspect of pain but rather deals with the patient holistically. This implies that the psychosocial, spiritual, and economic factors are well taken care of. Empowering severely ill individuals to make decisions and to appreciate life has helped discard the idea of resorting to merciful death as the only solution to avoid suffering. Today it is considered a heroic act to protect life because so much of it is being lost through the emergence of dangerous diseases that threaten to exterminate humanity. Life is weaved up by social, spiritual, and psychological factors among others, across different cultures, the spiritual aspect though is different in practice, but it is unified by a common denominator of protecting life. Life is regarded as sacred and taking away life is considered a sinful and repugnant act. Some communities believe that the deity they worship gives life to them and when one terminates life punishment is inflicted upon the instigator. This renders euthanasia unacceptable among many communities that believe in supernatural punishment when on erroneously terminates a life. It is unethical to propose euthanasia for a terminally ill patient who believes that any form of killing is unacceptable in his or her religious belief. When euthanasia has been accepted in a community that once opposed it, other unanticipated issues can come about (Corner, Hahn, & Oaksford, 2011). Social acceptance of euthanasia may subject patients on undue pressure to tag themselves as a burden to the community and request death as the only option of relieving their pain and family from the stresses of the illness. On the other hand, some patients may demand for euthanasia with ill motives to blackmail or exploit the over-conscientious caretaker. Similarly, some patients may die knowing that the family or the significant other might have requested for euthanasia when in fact this is untrue, the controversy, and mistrust surrounding this practice is unhealthy to the family unity of the dying patients. To sum up, euthanasia creates a lot of commotion and destabilizes ethical principles in health care as well as the vast majority does not cordially receive it. So many challenges come up on mentioning euthanasia, coercion, loss of autonomy, the difficult to enforce and monitor all work to the disadvantage of euthanasia. The technical aspect of euthanasia will disapprove in most cases the practice, this is in consideration of diagnostic errors and medical advancements in curing conditions initially considered terminal. Most of cultural and spiritual practices do not favour euthanasia since they life is seen as sacred. With the many setbacks associated with euthanasia it is clear that it must be sidelined and rejected, not to be practiced for whatever reasons. References Corner, A., Hahn, U., & Oaksford, M. (2011). The psychological mechanism of the slippery slope argument. Journal of Memory and Language, 64, 133–152. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2010.10.002 Emanuel, E. J., Fairclough, D. L., & Emanuel, L. L. (2000). Attitudes and desires related to euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide among terminally ill patients and their caregivers. JAMA : The Journal of the American Medical Association, 284, 2460–2468. doi:10.1097/00132586-200108000-00022 Smets, T., Bilsen, J., Cohen, J., Rurup, M. L., & Deliens, L. (2010). Legal euthanasia in Belgium: characteristics of all reported euthanasia cases. Medical Care, 48, 187–192. doi:10.1097/MLR.0b013e3181bd4dde Smets, T., Bilsen, J., Cohen, J., Rurup, M. L., Mortier, F., & Deliens, L. (2010). Reporting of euthanasia in medical practice in Flanders, Belgium: cross sectional analysis of reported and unreported cases. BMJ (Clinical Research Ed.), 341, c5174. doi:10.1136/bmj.c5174 Van Alphen, J. E., Donker, G. A., & Marquet, R. L. (2010). Requests for euthanasia in general practice before and after implementation of the Dutch Euthanasia Act. British Journal of General Practice, 60, 263–267. doi:10.3399/bjgp10X483931  Read More