Lady Cediel Pantevis

English Advanced
Final Essay
Dolly Gutierrez
July, 2019
The dark side of Euthanasia

During the last years, medicine has advanced too far; people have learned to treat

diseases that in previous times had no cure. However, there are still a great number of

illnesses that cannot be cured at present, and cause painful suffering to people who have

them. For that reason, medicine has created euthanasia, the way to accelerate the death of

an evicted patient with the purpose to avoid her or his suffering. Nevertheless, euthanasia

has become a subject of strong controversy; due to the different political, economic, ethical

and religious factors surrounding it. For many people, euthanasia is a "dignified" or "good"

way to die, specifically for those people who have terminal and painful illnesses. However,

there are also opponents to this rationale, who claim that euthanasia is another way to

commit murder and end with the opportunity to a person to survive and continue with his or

her life. So, the main cause of this controversial issue is whether euthanasia should be

allowed, and the answer should be “No”.

Firstly, euthanasia should not be allowed because it goes against the right to life.

Life is a fundamental right established and protected in legitimate national and international

documents around the world. In Colombia, for example, we have the eleventh article of the

Colombian Constitution that claimed “The right to life is inviolable. There will be no death

penalty.” In that sense, the article refers to the fact that no action or person can tempt

against the health or life of another person without any exception. Furthermore, the third

article of human rights mentions that “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of
person”. So, the article states that it is a duty to protect, respect and guarantee the life and

dignity of every human being. In addition, different religious laws disapprove of euthanasia

because it goes against the commandments established by God in the Holy Bible. To give

an example, the seventh commandment of the Bible that says “you must not kill".

Therefore, religious people believe that God gives people life, and he only has the right to

take it away. Lastly, euthanasia should not be allowed because it breaches the right to life

as set out in political, social and religious laws around the world and all the rights that

derive from it.

Secondly, euthanasia could increase the homicide rate due to economic issues. As

we all know, terminal or serious diseases have expensive treatments that hinder the process

of patients due to must be invested all the treatments, specialists, and medicines to prolong

life. Therefore, many people could choose euthanasia because of the economic “ease” it

offers compared to the other medical treatments. Moreover, euthanasia may be a means of

committing other crimes. For example, many families may approve euthanasia in their

affected family members with the goal of obtaining legacies, pensions, or life insurances.

Also, euthanasia can be used for organ trafficking; as we all know some of the most

valuable and expensive things in the world are our organs as these are not easily found and

are really important. On the whole, euthanasia can cause the death of many people due to

the economic interests of their relatives or those responsible in the process of their illness.

On the other hand, we can also find some benefits about euthanasia such as ending

the pain of those affected people and decreasing the cost of those diseases. Many terminal

illnesses involve painful processes for the affected people and their families; due to the

different situations they must face daily. To give an example, the drastic change in their
lifestyle, their physical appearance, their coexistence with others and the pain caused by the

disease and its treatments. For that reason, they find a dignified and peaceful way to die

with euthanasia. Likewise, euthanasia can decrease the expenses that are invested in these

diseases, since their easy execution (the administration of a dose of morphine or the

omission of medical procedures) requires a lower cost. After all, we can say that euthanasia

can facilitate and accelerate the process and the death of the affected people.

Moreover, euthanasia could change the efficiency of medicine. To begin with,

medicine should be against euthanasia since it would lose its professional ethics because its

main objective is to save and/or prolong lives while euthanasia is to end them. In addition,

euthanasia could be a reason to decrease the resources destined to the cure of diseases since

it could be cheaper and easier to implement euthanasia. Likewise, the research effort of

medicine could reduce because the solution to new and little-known situations would be

euthanasia. Finally, we can say that the social pressure on the performer (the doctor) of the

act could increase in order to end the lives of those people who consider themselves weak,

subnormal or incapacitated. To conclude, as a consequence of euthanasia the medicine

could be completely affected and changed.

In conclusion, euthanasia is a controversial subject that includes different opinions;

where some people think it should be allowed because it is the only solution to end

suffering, and others believe it should not be allowed because it is a sacrilege to human life.

In my personal opinion, even though euthanasia provides some benefits to people affected

from these terminal illnesses, it should not be allowed because it ends all life expectancy,

and does not give the opportunity to look for more options to prolong it.