Right to Die

The idea of end-of-life decision is an on-going critical topic that has divided the healthcare industry as well as the public on who entirely has the right to decide when the human life ends. On one hand, there is the palliative care special group which consists of care experts who believe in the sanctity of life, even in the extreme cases where the patient is bedridden and needs day and night special care. On the other hand, there are proponents of voluntary euthanasia who advocate for giving the patient the right to death to release them from endless pain. This choice or right to choose one’s means of death or the right to die with dignity has become a concern for various stakeholders after the public and various stakeholders in the healthcare industry decided to influence changes in legal stipulations. These legal stipulations are in accordance with the need to allow patients to have the final say when their medical conditions are untreatable and are confirmed that they will have to live the rest of their lives under the medication and constant pain. In such a situation the patient has the right to request to be euthanized despite the ethical viewpoints of the medical team.

In the healthcare industry, ethical conflicts in the determination of whether an act is right or wrong are based on consequentialism and deontology theories. The latter offers criteria for decision making based on the consequences of the proposed action, such that an action is ethically right if it results in making the society happier. The former theory assumes that ethical decisions should be based on moral guidelines despite the results achieved (Cohen, 2014). The application of both theories depending on the situation of each patient means that health practitioners should prioritize the beneficial outcome the treatment has on the quality of life of the patient. Doctors are bound by non-maleficence (not to harm). However, if the condition of the sick is expected to worsen, then the doctors will be essentially causing more pain and harm to the patient and should thus respect their wish to die. At this point, it would be unethical for the doctors to conflict with the wishes of the client.

The right to die for patients who have a bleak future in regards to recovering or any major medical invention in the near future to save them from terminal illnesses should be a decision left for the individual to decide. The important aspect should be that personal wishes are observed and that the doctors have exhausted every possible avenue that might have saved their lives with futile results. I believe these to be justifiable reasons. The humiliation and mortification that patients have to undergo during palliative care which often leaves them at the mercy of nurses or family members would be emotional torture especially if one had complete dependency on themselves before (Goligher, 2010). The drastic changes that sometimes involves the inability to eat on their own, visit the toilet or bathe themselves for the rest of their lives are too much to bear. Such