Title: ASSISTED SUICIDE – LEGAL ASPECTS AND ETHICAL DILEMMA
Abstract: The concept of “assisted suicide” dates back a long time ago in a particular form - in ancient Greece and Rome there was a fair amount of support for voluntary (and involuntary) mercy killings. But, the assisted suicide has taken its place in the legal codes of some of the developed countries in the recent years and has become a newsworthy topic valuable for discussion. Assisted suicide refers to terminally ill patients (with a disease that cannot be cured and will cause death) with pure consciousness and common sense, that want to die before the huge pains begin to occur and according to the law and after previous preparation and support, the medical council of doctors prescribe lethal doses of drugs, which the patients decide by themselves when and whether to use it. It’s a very controversial topic which is not sufficiently elaborated yet and can be analyzed from many aspects. The research focus in the paper is on the legal framework and moral-ethical dilemma in the countries that allow the assisted suicide, by using theoretical, empirical, comparative and cross-discipline researching methods. There are different views and opinions on this issue. A number of theorists accept the concept of assisted suicide as a relief for patients suffering from diseases that inflict enormous pain and which can not be cured, while the doctors do not take an active part in taking away the lives of the patients, believing that their moral responsibility would be reduced to a lower level; and there is a group of theorists, philosophers, doctors, lawyers and others who reject this concept with the explanation that it does not differ in anything from euthanasia and that thus does not reduce the level of responsibility of doctors and when a person's life can end depends only on God's will. This paper will discuss the views of both sides, both the supporters and those who are against assisted suicide. A distinction will be made with euthanasia - when the doctor legally and directly ends the life of the patient in order to relieve pain and suffering. In order to categorize assisted suicide as one of the manners of voluntarily depriving the lives of severely ill patients, several appropriate examples will be indicated in which the right to assisted suicide was used by the patients in countries where this institute is permitted and will briefly consider the legal framework in countries where there is adequate legal regulation on this issue. Medical, religious, psychological, philosophical aspects of the assisted suicide will be also covered briefly in this paper. Of course, the ultimate goal of this research is to determine the benefits, but also the weaknesses of the concept of assisted suicide in the direction of protecting and exercising the rights of patients written in the main conclusions of this paper that show the rightness of implementing the assisted suicide in the legislation of the countries, the legal issues and the potential dangers of abuse.
Publication Year: 2020
Publication Date: 2020-03-13
Language: en
Type: article
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