Euthanasia, otherwise known as physician-assisted suicide, is the act of ending a person's life with the intention of relieving them of their intractable suffering. There are two main classifications of euthanasia: voluntary euthanasia and involuntary euthanasia. There are also two procedural classifications: passive euthanasia and active euthanasia. Voluntary euthanasia is done with the patient's consent, while involuntary euthanasia is done without consent where another person makes the decision because the patient is unable to do it on their own (Nordqvist 1). Passive euthanasia is done when "life-sustaining treatments are withheld" and active euthanasia is done when "lethal substances or forces are used to end the patient's life" (Nordqvist 1). Within the United States, physician-assisted suicide is currently legal in California, Montana, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington. The idea of this practice is appealing to many people and terminal patients because no one enjoys suffering, nor do families enjoy watching their loved ones suffer. However, there is much controversy surrounding the practice of euthanasia. This practice is beginning to taint the original intentions of medicine while compromising the doctor-patient role. It uses what is meant to treat and cure patients to actually end their lives prematurely. Euthanasia may, at first, seem like a great option for patients with terminal illnesses, however there are many known faults within this practice and there should be an illegalization of euthanasia across the entire United States. 

Euthanasia is never a necessary choice for a patient or a patient's family to make and go through with. There are better options that have nothing to do with ending lives. The most common option that a patient has is palliative care. Palliative care is "able to control physical, psychological, social, spiritual and existential suffering" (Living with Dignity). With this care, euthanasia, or physician-assisted suicide, is not a necessary treatment. Palliative care is an effective practice for terminally ill patients and it is already legal throughout the entire United States. One of the main goals of this practice is "for the patients and families to accept dying as a normal process" (Nordqvist 1). At some point in a person's life, they will have to understand that death will come about, whether it is at the right time or not. Palliative care is able to provide comfort, care, and relief to a patient and their family while helping them understand their illness and their future.

Physicians should be more interested in the practice of palliative care rather than the practice of euthanasia. In fact, physician-assisted suicide compromises the intended roles of doctors and medicine itself. Physician-assisted suicide permits "the tools of healing to be used as techniques for killing" (Anderson n.p.). All physicians are required to take the Hippocratic Oath when they begin their careers in the medical field. The original form of this oath states that "I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect" and "I will come for the benefit of the sick" (Bioethics n.p.). This oath promises that physicians will always protect life, however there are many physicians who support and carry out the practice of euthanasia to end lives. Medically-assisted suicide also compromises the doctor-patient relationship. It causes the patient's trust in their physician to decrease. With the legalization of euthanasia, "patients will begin to question the motives of doctors who suggest considering the possibility of assisted suicide" (Pesch n.p.). Patients and their families will wonder whether physicians are considering the best possible options for them or if they are only worried about their own convenience. The goal of doctors and those in the medical profession "should be to assist patients to live long, healthy lives rather than to pursue expedited deaths" (Pesch n.p.). Physicians should be more worried about prolonging the lives of their patients and providing comfort. Killing should not be on the minds of physicians when it comes to their duties as a medical professional. The duty of a physician is to always provide care, not to kill. "Killing is incompatible with caring" and doctors who allow this practice to come into their list of responsibilities are causing a corruption of medicine (Anderson n.p.). 

Physicians should not only be striving to provide the best possible treatment for their terminal patients, but they should also strive to provide comfort to their loved ones as well. Becoming diagnosed with a terminal illness is never easy on a person and their loved ones and physician-assisted suicide often seems like the easy way out for them. Terminal patients often get to the point of feeling like they are such a burden on their family and they end up thinking that euthanasia is their only option. The legalization of euthanasia "may be reason enough for them to end their lives prematurely" (Jackson n.p.). This feeling of being a burden is frightening for most patients even if their family does not feel that way at all about them. Introducing physician-assisted suicide as a possible option for terminal patients "would undermine familial relationships and promote the view that disabled and elderly relatives are not people to be loved but burdens to manage" (Anderson n.p.). A healthcare system that encourages euthanasia "limits the quality of care and may create pressure on patients, making them choose death" (Living with Dignity n.p.). If euthanasia was illegal nationwide, less patients would feel like an encumbrance on their loved ones which would then reduce the amount of people who desire to end their lives. 

The legalization of euthanasia not only leads to higher assisted-suicide rates, but also leads to higher non-assisted suicide rates among citizens. In the state of Oregon, where euthanasia is currently legal, their suicide rate "is now forty-one percent higher than the national average" (Jackson n.p.). People who are around others who are committing suicide are more likely to end up committing suicide themselves. "Once you introduce suicide as a reasonable way out for some, that message is heard by everyone ... Restrictions become arbitrary and it becomes a slippery slope" (Jackson n.p.). The slippery slope fallacy of euthanasia argues that with it becoming legalized, it will eventually lead to the involuntary euthanasia of some people. It will put "pressure on our most vulnerable citizens to commit suicide" (Pesch n.p.). The idea of this slippery slope may seem extreme to many people, but as time goes on, many new ideas and practices are becoming acceptable. For example, in Belgium, "ten years after the legalization of euthanasia, the law was amended to allow euthanasia for children with incurable diseases, regardless of their age" (Living with Dignity n.p.). In the states that euthanasia is legal in the United States, more specifically in Oregon, patients considered to become euthanized must be an adult, eighteen years of age or older. The laws regarding euthanasia in Belgium began similarly to the laws of Oregon and ten years later it was altered to include children. With that being said, many ideas that may seem impossible right now could become possible over a short time period. Legalizing euthanasia is a very slippery slope and could lead to many undesirable actions. 

Although it is not often reported, there are plenty of abuses within the practice of physician assisted suicide. For example, in 2008, a woman named Barbara Wagner was seeking treatment for her lung cancer and a man named Randy Stroup desired treatment for his prostate cancer. They each "received a letter from Oregon Medicaid officials" and in the letter, "officials denied the costly treatments, but listed assisted suicide as one of the recommended treatments the state would cover" (Jackson n.p.). The state was willing to pay for the termination of these individual's lives, however they were not willing to pay and provide treatment to prolong their existence. More abuse of the practice is known from other countries, however the legalization of euthanasia in the United States opens doors for more abuse here. In Belgium, "deaf twins were euthanized at their request because they became blind" and "a woman was euthanized because she was suffering from anorexia" (Living with Dignity n.p.). It is becoming easier and easier for a person to become euthanized in other countries. There are even cases in these countries where people have been euthanized for clinical depression. Who is to say that this will not happen throughout the United States? Laws regarding euthanasia are constantly changing and one day a child may be able to undergo euthanasia because of something similar to depression. Many terminal patients turn to a physician to become euthanized when they are under a great amount of depression and are in great need of counseling. Many patients who are in need of counseling and view death as their only option often never get the opportunity to have such counseling. In Oregon, "a physician can assist in the performance of a suicide without first exploring in depth the concerns of his patient that led him or her to request suicide assistance" (DeCelles n.p.). Requiring that a patient receives counseling prior to making the decision to become euthanized could drastically decrease the amount of assisted suicides that partake. In the years of 2007 and 2009 "not even one patient killed by suicide ... was referred for a psychological evaluation" (DeCelles n.p.). This shows just how easy it is to undergo assisted suicide in the states where it has become legalized. 

One of the biggest arguments for the legalization of euthanasia is dignity. People supporting euthanasia believe that a person should be allowed to die with dignity. However, the practice of physician-assisted suicide "violates human dignity and denies equality before the law" (Anderson n.p.). All humans are born with essential dignity and worth. The legal system of the United States needs to respect the dignity inherited by every human being by doing everything in their will to prevent innocent lives from being taken. Supporters of physician-assisted suicide argue that it is a natural right for people to be able to decide when they want to die, however "no natural right to physician-assisted suicide exists and arguments for such a right are indeed incoherent" (Anderson n.p.). If a legal system allows physician-assisted suicide, it will "undermine the natural right to life for all of its citizens" (Anderson n.p.). The legalization of euthanasia tells a patient that their life is not worth living and that they have an absence of dignity. 

Patients with terminal illnesses are usually given an estimated time of their remaining life, whether it be a few days or a few years. However, this estimate given is not always correct because no one truly knows how long a person will live. People who are told that they may only have a short amount of time left to live are usually drawn toward the idea of euthanasia, but when "59-year-old Laurie Hoirup was a year old, doctors ... predicted she only had months to live" (Jackson n.p.). Ever since then, Hoirup, a resident of California, has been outliving the predictions of her doctors. She was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy and requires a ventilator. Hoirup "depends on family members and caregivers to feed, bathe, and groom her and to assist her with using the restroom" (Jackson n.p.). Although she is dependent on others and could easily become euthanized, Hoirup copes with her disease and has become a national example of a patient with a terminal illness who outlived her doctor's predictions and is content with where she is in life. There is a man, named Paulo Henrique Machado, who contracted polio shortly after his mother died two days after giving birth to him. Machado was raised in a hospital and has always been attached to an artificial respirator. He is "currently a man of forty-five [and] he finds his life fulfilling. He is cheerful and happy" (DeCelles n.p.). It is very possible for terminal patients to be content with their life and to enjoy the things that they are able to do. It is obviously harder on them to have a normal and happy life than a healthy person, but like Machado and Hoirup, people with terminal illnesses are capable of living a fulfilling life also. There is also the possibility that a cure will be found for a patient who is suffering from an illness or that the patient's original diagnosis is wrong. Physician's should be more concerned with finding cures and treatments or correct diagnoses instead of trying to decide the best way for them to assist in the termination of a patient's life.  

People arguing for the legalization of euthanasia often state that "it is more humane to allow a person with intractable suffering to be allowed to choose to end that suffering" (Nordqvist n.p.). However, this deviates from the original purposes of medicine. Many people also believe that "every individual should be given the ability to die with dignity", but many patients chose the act of euthanasia because of the burden they feel like they are on their loved ones (Nordqvist n.p.). People often relate the euthanasia of humans to that of animals. They say that "it is seen as an act of kindness" and question "Why should this kindness be denied to humans?" (Nordqvist n.p.). This kindness that they are referring to is merely death and it is not uncommon that physicians find cures for a terminal patient's illness after they become euthanized. Arguments for euthanasia also state that there is a drain on resources. They state that physicians are using too many resources on saving the lives of terminal patients who will not make it when they should be used on other life-saving treatments. This is not the way that medicine was intended to work. Physicians and other health care providers should be doing and using whatever resources it takes to treat all of their patients, no matter what their illness is. 

There are far too many faults and abuses within the practice of euthanasia and there are much better options for patients who are suffering from terminal illnesses. Patients should not have to feel like ending their life is the only option that they have. Medical professionals and a patient's loved ones should be constantly encouraging them and looking for new ways to provide palliative care for them. They should not be under the impression that they are a burden on their family or even the doctors, but they should feel like the people around them are doing everything they possibly can to help and treat their illnesses. The role of medicine should not be compromised by the legalization of euthanasia. Medicine was never intended to harm or kill a patient, but it was intended to provide care and treatment for illnesses and disorders. Assisted suicide is not a proper treatment; it is merely death. Euthanasia does seem like a good idea at first to patients who suffer from terminal illnesses, however the cons outweigh the pros of this practice. The practice of euthanasia is so centered around death and killing ill patients when we, as a society, need to focus more on health and life and less on death. There should be a mass illegalization of physician-assisted suicide across the United States.

