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With the exception of abortion,
there is no topic in health care more controversial today than that
of physician-assisted suicide.
Most ethicists tell us that, the
moment society decided that patients have the right
to terminate their own life-sustaining therapies, any ethical
blockade to assisted suicide also disappeared. (For that matter,
they tell us, any ethical blockade to frank euthanasia is also
gone.) The U.S. Supreme Court stopped short of declaring a general right to
assisted suicide, but did allow states to determine the issue
on their own. Oregon already has physician-assisted suicide statutes
on the books.
There are indeed cases - albeit much
more rare than assisted suicide enthusiasts would have us believe -
where it would seem inhumane to withhold assisted suicide. But
before society embraces this means to the end with any more
enthusiasm than it already has, we ought to consider the full
implications of assisted suicide, and where it is likely to lead
against a backdrop of widespread, covert health care rationing.
We at YourDoctorintheFamily.com
find
it suspicious that, in some circles, the call for a universal right
to assisted suicide seems to take precedence over a universal right
to health care. As part of our ongoing mission to help you
understand and survive the health care system, we examine both the
ethics of assisted suicide, and the cost-savings
aspects of assisted suicide, and ask the question - which aspect
is really driving all the fervor? Finally, we look at the likely
effect on society if we
grant universal access to assisted suicide before we grant universal
access to health care.
We also
offer a more general treatment of end-of-life
issues in an era of covert rationing.
Don't thank us. It's what we do.
We're your
on-line guide to understanding and
surviving the American health care system.
YourDoctorintheFamily.com
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