Assisted suicide, commonly known as voluntary euthanasia, is a highly contentious issue. Ethics, morals, religion, politics, and personal beliefs all play a role in the debate. As a society with advanced medical treatment, we have prolonged death more than needed and in some cases, longer than a terminally ill person wishes, leading to a diminished quality of life. Supporting assisted suicide allows a terminally ill person to decide for a dignified and humane death while at the same time it lessens the burden of cost from expensive treatments.
Using technology against one’s will is cruel and inhuman, especially if pain is a constant factor. It should be the right of the patient to die without undue pain or more suffering to themselves. In the case of Lester Tomlinson, “he cried out and asked his daughter to help him die because the pain was so terrible” (Tucker 215). While Tomlinson was able to express his pain and desire for relief, this isn’t the case with dementia…show more content… “Adequate pain relief is a question of social justice not merely personal fortune or privilege” (Buckley 338). While considering the financial implications of artificially extending life against a person’s will, it is a necessary point to the argument supporting assisted suicide. Advanced treatment to extend the life of a terminally ill patient is not guaranteed and often times fails at improving or lengthening their life. A 2015 National Institute of Health study shows the average total health care costs for people with dementia was $287,038 in their last 5 years of life. This was significantly higher than the costs for those who died of heart disease ($175,136), cancer ($173,383), or other causes ($197,286). Medicare covers some of the cost but the out-of-pocket costs to families is staggering. Hospitalization often means aggressive, high-cost treatment at the expense of quality of
