Physician Assisted Suicide Summary

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Pages: 3

Physician Assisted Suicide (PAS) In this time period we are in people have more freedom to express themselves, to do what they want with their body and their life. Should the decision to live with a terminal illness or die fall under that category? Since the case of Gonzales vs. Oregon, the first state to legalize PAS, the big debate is should a dying patient have the right to cut their time short when they want and is it morally right for a physician to assist in this? In Ryan T. Anderson’s article, “Physician-Assisted Suicide Corrupts the Practice of Medicine”, he argues his point of view on the subject. He argues that Physician Assisted Suicide isn’t right and uses a number of physicians’ views and insurance company’s incentives to back up his stance on this particular subject. In Anderson’s article he quotes doctors and lawyers perspectives on PAS, all who agree that PAS isn’t ethically right. He uses these statements throughout the entire article as evidence to support his idea, but these statements are merely opinions and aren’t logical facts. Throughout the article he also states his own opinions as …show more content…
Anderson says things like “the heart of medicine is to heal” (Pg. 1), “they seek to eliminate disease, not eliminate the patient” (Pg. 1), and “the physician devotes himself to healing the sick” (Pg. 2). He says things like this all through the paper, especially “eliminate a patient”, he says this repeatedly. Using the word eliminate to refer to a dying patient, seems wicked or immoral which touches the reader. The wording can persuade a reader to start to agree with Anderson or leave mixed feelings to a reader who had the view of opposing his stance on this topic. Because Anderson uses text like this again and again in the article from beginning to end, the mixed feelings and idea that his point of view may be right is stuck with the