In recent years there has been controversy over the ethical concerns associated with euthanasia. There are disagreements in the areas concerned with both legal rights and individual's moralities. Some people would argue that every person has the right to decide their life course, while others reason that no doctor should be allowed to purposefully end someone's life. Five states in the United States: Washington, Oregon, California, Vermont, and some parts of New Mexico, ("Where Is Euthanasia Legal? | New Health Guide"). have already legalized Euthanasia, and successfully completed hundreds of operations. Meanwhile, other states are still in the process of passing laws, and debating all the fine details. In cases that deal with terminal illnesses, the patients often spend their last days in extreme amounts of pain and suffering. These extra days of suffering add unnecessary stress and sadness onto both the patients and their families. The added time also adds medical expenses onto people or families who usually already have more bills than they can afford, causing even more distress. For this reason, I believe that if the patient is in a mental state that allows them to make a well-informed decision, then they should be granted access to the use of euthanasia. Not everyone fits into this category, but it is essential that those who do are able to get the most possible from it.

Through my research of this topic, one of the areas that receives repeated debate is centered around the idea of suffering, and what it means to be in unmanageable pain. Often times the families are the ones making this decision, because the patient is not in a stable state to make such a significant decision. One article described how in some countries people with chronic depression are given the option of Euthanasia (Buchanan). This demonstrates misuse of the treatment because Euthanasia should not be used in instances that have the opportunity to be treated. Depression has successful treatment interventions and medicine that provide the opportunity for remission, where as some physical diseases do not offer the same types of success. The same article talked about a common misconception that patients experience during the last stages of treatment, where there is often the most pain. The author discussed how the patient wants an end to the pain and suffering, which can be confused as wanting their life ended. Yet, this is not the case with these terminal types of illnesses because of the complexity of them. The treatment of diseases such as cancer require patients to go through horrible amounts of pain in order to receive remission. The patients want to be free from the pain that treatment causes them, but they often do not want the cost of this to be ending their lives, even though sometimes that is the only option. Euthanasia should only be used in cases where treatment will not yield success, and the patient is experiencing extreme amounts of pain from these ineffective treatments. If Euthanasia is offered for all types of diseases, even those with the possibility of success, there will be thousands of lives ended which could have been treated given the proper care.

The legal aspect of Euthanasia is controversial because the act itself is considered, by some, to be homicide. In addition, it goes against the Hippocratic oath which requires physicians to swear to protect the humanitarian uses of medicine, and do everything they can to protect their patients. However, in the instance where the patient is suffering from a terminal illness with no chance of recovery, it can be justified that the physician is doing everything they can to protect their patient. On the other hand, euthanasia is a human right because everyone should have the freedom to decide how they end their life, whether it is suicide or assisted suicide. Since it is your body, you should have the choice as to what you do to it. Everyday you get to make the choice of what you put into your body, and how you care for it, so why shouldn't you have the same choice as to when you end it? As long as the patient gives clear consent to the physician about the choice they are making, there is no reason they shouldn't be able to undergo this procedure. Since death is a personal matter, it should be a decision made by the individual and therefore no one should be prevented from making a choice about how they choose to die. In addition, euthanasia could save extreme amounts of healthcare money by preventing the spending on terminal illness treatment options. With the money spent on these types of diseases, and their low success rates, it is questionable if its worth it in the long run. Euthanasia would eliminate the need for extensive hospital bills that come from these horrible diseases. 

One study was conducted in the United Kingdom containing first hand interviews with individuals who cared for someone with dementia, and had them pass away from the disease. The study included 16 participants who were chosen from online advertisements, and through random sampling. After an initial phone interview, they were brought to a location of their choice for the main interview to be conducted. This study included questions about participant's opinions on euthanasia, and whether or not they thought the person they cared for would have benefited from it. A common response from the participants in the study was to think that the patient had suffered too much, and that they deserved to be free from the pain. Some even said, "I think basically it is almost cruel to keep them alive" (Tomlinson, Spector, Nurock & Stott, 2015). When referring to the patients suffering, the family members had a common desire to bring happiness back to these people. However, this isn't an easy thing to do when dealing with serious illnesses because so much time is spent in treatment. It it realistic for euthanasia to be used on patients who, "are beyond enjoying anything" (Tomlinson et al. 720-726), said one of the family members of the dementia patients. When the participants were asked to put them self in the position of suffering from dementia, their responses seemed to change. Their main reason for wanting treatment was because they didn't want to become a burden on their families. These participants were concerned with the emotional strain their families were going through, and thought euthanasia would be a simple way to eliminate this hassle. Many of the participants in the study claimed that they would have wanted to have the option of euthanasia if they were going through the rough parts of treatment. When patients are in a sickly mindset and are unable to make the decision about euthanasia for themselves the burden is often put on the families. If there was a universal law about the criteria a patient must fit in order to receive euthanasia that could reduce a lot of stress from the family and the patient. Also, if euthanasia were to become legal these principles would understandably be made in order to make this treatment effective and safe. Since these laws have not been put into place yet, there is sneaking around by doctors which could be prevented. It would take time to come up with concrete laws and standards of procedures, however in the long run it would be well worth it.

One main argument against legalizing euthanasia is that it goes against the ethical value of killing innocent people who still have days to live in their lives. Religion plays a large part in many people's opinions on euthanasia for this reason. Christians believe that God created life, and that he should be the one in charge of when life ends as well. They believe that euthanasia gets in the way of life's natural process that God has created for them, and the spiritual time that are the days before death (BBC - Religions - Christianity: Euthanasia). Advocates against euthanasia believe that ending someone's life before they have experienced their last moments is wrong. They say that, "you should want to spend their last moments of life with them, not ending it early". However, in practice euthanasia only ends peoples lives around one week earlier than the disease would have ended it (Euthanasia Facts, Information, Pictures | Encyclopedia.Com Articles About Euthanasia). Also, spending the last moments with someone while they are miserable could cause the final memories of that person to be negative, which causes even more distress. Euthanasia could reduce the grieving time for families and friends because it would eliminate the time spent wondering how long the pain of the patient will last. In addition, it also seems to be more unethical to withhold this kind of option from patients who would benefit and be free from their suffering. In these situations, it would be permanently undesirable to see one of your family member sick, during the last times you will ever see them. Instead, when someone is going through a difficult treatment and doesn't have a chance of living they should be put out of that misery. If euthanasia is legalized for these situations, then the patients and their families would be able to have positive memories during these unfortunate situations, and not have to watch their loved ones die in misery. Many people refer to euthanasia as, "dying with dignity" because letting a disease kill someone is not the way anyone wants to end their life. Choosing to take a stand against a terminal disease and pulling the plug yourself is an extremely powerful action.

Some arguments have been made about the power that would be given to doctors with the legalization of euthanasia. Those who oppose euthanasia argue that power could be easily abused in an industry where there are already deceiving behaviors taking place. However, if euthanasia does not become legal, the secrets will become worse than they currently are. Doctors now are getting away with these procedures without any punishment because patients want the procedure, and these doctors are willing to provide this to them. Doctors aren't allowed to give patients what they are asking for, if suicide is the route they are looking for, but instead they can give hints. For example, a doctor can prescribe medicine and warn the patient that if a certain amount is taken, it could kill them (Dembosky). There was a large legal case with a man named Jack Kevorkian who was responsible for carrying out multiple acts of euthanasia where the patient and their family did not agree to the procedure. Many of the families were unaware of the treatment being administered, and did not give full consent to him at the time. He was taken to court multiple times from multiple different families, yet he was never charged with anything (Wolfson, 2006). This is how physicians work around the illegality of euthanasia, which just causes it to be more dangerous. Overall 3% of doctors in the U.S have written a prescription for a life ending medicine, even though euthanasia is only legal in 5 states in the United States (Keown). If euthanasia were to become legalized it would make the process much safer for everyone involved. Physicians could be in enormous amounts of legal trouble if they were found to be participating in these types of illegal activities. The patients and their families involved could have negative consequences too if the physician isn't careful in what they are prescribing. The same dosage might not be right for everyone and if something goes wrong that family is in a worse situation than they were before. Having these types of uniform laws would allow safer administration of euthanasia, without physicians having to sneak around and break laws in order to give their patients what they want. Not all physicians should be allowed to offer this treatment type, so there would have to be special training exclusively for the practice of euthanasia. This concept would ensure more safety and security in a procedure that is high risk yet central to the world of medicine. The medical industry could become corrupt if no laws come out on the topic of assisted suicide and euthanasia. Until proper treatment is created for the terminal illnesses, people will continue to struggle through the hard times, and doctors will continue to break the rules to end the suffering.

Since euthanasia is legal in other countries there have been operations completed which don't follow the legal guidelines. Euthanasia was created to be used in instances where the patient is suffering from a terminal illness, and is experiencing extreme amounts of suffering. There are cases that have been completed in other countries that should not have been carried out because they don't meet these criteria. For example, there was a serial rapist and murder in Belgium who requested euthanasia because he was experiencing extreme amounts of mental distress (Spencer). He had been in jail for thirty years for his crime, and his guilt had taken a toll on him. He said he was unable to control his sexual urges, which is why he was requesting euthanasia. This man was not the only prisoner who had requested for this because of his mental struggles while in jail. Since these people had done terrible things to get them into jail, it's not fair for them to get out on the basis that they were suffering. The victims in these cases would not want these people to get off easy for their actions, and many people would agree. These situations do not belong in the same category as people dying from terminal diseases, and requesting euthanasia. There were multiple other instances of patients receiving euthanasia without the terminal illness or unbearable suffering. One of these being an elderly couple with a fear of living without one another (OAP Couple To Die Together By Assisted Suicide). They were both in their eighties with healthy medical records, and nothing causing any sort of distress on them. However, they requested euthanasia because they had a fear of being alone without one another, and for this reason euthanasia was granted to them. In my opinion, this is a normal part of human life that shouldn't be cut short due to fear. People who oppose euthanasia would say that this is the government allowing suicide which in some circumstances is true. Although I strongly believe that euthanasia should be legalized, cases such as these should not be allowed under the euthanasia laws. 

Euthanasia often has a negative connotation in the medical field as a way of giving up on a valuable life. However, when a terminal illness takes over an innocent person's life there isn't always much they can do to fight back. Sometimes the best option is to end a life with dignity, and to end it on a positive note. Rather than endure the last moments of life in pain, people should be able to chose to end their lives peacefully with their families by their side. When a death is drawn out from a terminal disease it causes extreme amounts of suffering on not only the patient, but their families too. Euthanasia can be a successful medical option if the correct precautions are put in place in order to ensure maximum safety. Since this act has been talked about more commonly in recent years, it is obvious that there is still lots of research and debating that needs to be done in order to ensure it is done properly. However, once these guidelines are determined euthanasia could become a widely used treatment option for those people who deserve it, and would benefit from it the most. 

