Physician-Assisted Suicide

Physician-assisted suicide has been regarded by some as a logical adjunct to treatment of the terminally ill. It is becoming fairly widely accepted on the basis that it relieves suffering and empowers the patient to facilitate that relief. However, these arguments gloss over the true foundational issue underlying physician-assisted suicide: complicity to render an unethical practice acceptable by cloaking it in the guise of mercy.

Brody and Miller (1995) state categorically, "If medicine is essentially a healing enterprise, then physicians should never help patients die." They reference Leon Kass, whose position is that "the essence of medicine its inner normative meaning and purpose is healing, which physician-assisted death contravenes." If the goal of medicine is to heal, then physician-assisted suicide not only mitigates against that goal; it defeats it. Although "First Do No Harm" is not actually in the Hippocratic Oath as generally believed, it is still the basic premise that medical practice must be constrained to observe. Even the Co

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