The debate about legalization of Euthanasia in United States of America has been hitting the headlines since early 1800s. This was after the New York state passed the law against the practice and in unity to that, the other states in U.S followed the suit in the year 1828. Since then, the debate has been ruling the world. In the year 1938, a formed euthanasia society in United States went lobbying for assisted suicide to give the suffering patient a right to end his or her own life if the life had grown into the suffering state of no return. In 1994, dwellers of Oregon voted for the law, Death with Dignity Act which gave physicians freedom to assist patients in ending their own lives if their remaining days in life couldnt go beyond six months (Zimmermann 2016).
Terri Schiavo, a woman from Florida in United States who was lying on the bed for 15 years since 1990 was at last euthanized through the husbands request since the doctors had confirmed that she would never recover. She had a cardiac arrest and collapsed only to spend fifteen years in a vegetation state until 2005 when the court gave the husband a go ahead to allow the doctors carry out euthanasia. This is a case which led to the fight for the practice of euthanasia to be legalized in United States to save dear ones from extreme and lengthened suffering.
Terri Schiavos case is one among a million cases whereby the patients have been experiencing unending pain due to illegalization of euthanasia. One of the reasons that euthanasia should be legalized is to reduce pain and suffering to the patient who is visibly aware that he or she might not be cured from the disease or the health situation (Campbell 2016). For a patient to suffer for more than 10 years being bedridden is a total punishment of living under extreme pain when it is well known that they he or she cannot recover. In order to give a stop to the suffering condition, euthanasia should be legalized.
The second reason why euthanasia should be allowed is to end the trauma piled on both the patient and their families. It isnt anybodys wish to see his or her family and close relatives taking care of them while bedridden for more than half a year. The patients are usually traumatized since they usually see themselves as a bother to their family members and those who take care of them. They feel like the cause of trouble and discomfort for their kin and hence desire to die than rather keep on bothering them while knowing that they can never recover from their illness (Zimmermann 2016). The family members feel frustrated seeing one of their beloved ones suffering for years. They are usually traumatized by the state of their kin. They pity them on seeing them unable to talk or any other painful ailment and the more they see their state deteriorating, the more they get uneasy. It is good if euthanasia is globally allowed to stop the two parties from facing the trauma till death of the ailing person.
Keeping a bedridden patient in any hospital is very expensive. Piling the hospital bills for the family when the patient and the family know that the ailing person cannot recover into the normal condition is disturbing. The family is ripped off financially, made poor for paying the hospital bills and at last they die without any sign of recovery. It isnt fair to force the family into poverty due to supporting their ailing family member whom they well know that he or she cannot recover. The legalization of euthanasia will protect the families of the ailing from getting drained financially as well as unending duties of attending and visiting them .
Everyone deserves a dignified death, where he or she dies at a better state. When a person knows well that he or she will not survive or recover from the ailment, he or she has an opportunity to give out the will, say goodbye to the family members before he or she is given a dignified sendoff by the family (Young et al, 2018). By euthanizing the patient in early moments before the health deteriorate, the family feel at ease, waving their beloved one goodbye while at a better and a bit sound state than the end.
In conclusion, everyone should be given the right to take own life through euthanasia when the health state keep deteriorating and confirmed to be in a state of no recovery. Euthanasia legalization gives the patient a choice over their life, to choose whether to die by the doctors assistance or wait until their natural death comes. Euthanasia relieves the family from unending trauma and getting ripped off their money in raising the upkeep for the patients hospital bill. Also, the practice ends the traumatizing moments of the patient who sees bothering his or her own family members with the illness. Euthanasia should be allowed to give the patients a dignified death, when they can see, hear and move than waiting until they are extremely dumb, unable to see or walk.
References
Campbell, D. (2016). Real control over death: A critical evaluation of the voluntary euthanasia debate. Australian Rationalist, The, 101, 31.
Woods, M., & Bickley Asher, J. (2015). Nurses and the euthanasia debate: reflections from New Zealand. International nursing review, 62(1), 13-20.
Young, J., Egan, R., Walker, S., Graham-DeMello, A., & Jackson, C. (2018). The euthanasia debate: synthesising the evidence on New Zealander’s attitudes. Ktuitui: New Zealand Journal of Social Sciences Online, 1-21.
Zimmermann, N. (2016). A matter of life or death: the euthanasia debate under a human rights perspective. ex ante, (2), 41-48.
