For me, life is the most beautiful gift of God to mankind. Therefore, people and nations who destroy life through abortion and euthanasia are the poorest. I do not speak in terms of legality, but I believe that no human hand should be raised to end a life, as life is God’s gift to us, even in an unborn child.
—Mother Teresa
Euthanasia has its origin in Greece. The word means ‘good death’. There are various dimensions to it: it can be active or passive, and voluntary (with the patient’s consent) or involuntary (with the consent of the patient’s family members, relatives, or guardian). Moreover, there is physician-assisted euthanasia in which the physician facilitates the patient’s death by providing information that enables the patient to end their life. Society expects health professionals to ‘cure’; however, their role is also to provide palliative care.
Practicing euthanasia contradicts the core purpose of admitting a patient to the hospital, which is to receive palliative care. Furthermore, there are significant legal, ethical, religious, economic, and social ramifications.
The issue of decriminalizing euthanasia or assisted euthanasia is widely debated today. Only five jurisdictions in the world have legalized euthanasia or physician-assisted euthanasia: The Netherlands, Luxembourg, Canada, Victoria (Australia), and Western Australia. However, in India, abetment of suicide and attempted suicide are criminal offenses. Article 21 (Right to Life) of the Indian Constitution does not include the ‘right to die’.
Hence, according to the Indian Penal Code (IPC), Section 306 (Abetment of Suicide) violates Article 21 of the constitution. Therefore, Attempt to Suicide (IPC Sec 309) and Abetment of Suicide (IPC Sec 306) are two distinct offenses. A very strong concern is expressed that if euthanasia is legalized, the state may refuse to invest in health, which is the ‘right to life’.
According to the study of psychology, a suicide attempt is a psychiatric emergency and is considered a desperate call for help. A person intending to end their life needs help instead of punishment. These patients may be suffering from depression, schizophrenia, and substance abuse. Therefore, their mental status must be assessed. These kinds of patients need effective therapy, which requires rehabilitative care from health professionals.
Practicing euthanasia, in any form, is against ethics. Doctors, frustrated by a severely ill patient, may practice euthanasia if decriminalized, which is against professional ethics. Religiously, life and death are matters of God’s will, and no human should interfere. Additionally, there are risks of involuntary euthanasia. Family members or relatives may have malicious intentions to inherit the patient’s property. Instead, palliative care provides dignified deaths for the patient and caregivers.
People in favor of euthanasia talk about scarce resources. They argue that it is better to practice euthanasia and end one’s suffering than wasting our scarce and valuable resources on a partially dead person. To counter this argument, I would say that the idea and intention of a welfare state is to provide care when a cure is not possible, using low-cost methods. Many doctors ask relatives or guardians to get the patient discharged from the hospital and wait for death to come. Many comply, some due to the heavy expenditure on medical treatments and some due to the realization that the patient’s case is hopeless, leaving them to only pray to God. This way, the sanctity of life is preserved.
Keeping all that aside, even if euthanasia gets legalized, how are we going to keep it away from our children? What if a child gets severely ill? Many of us cannot endorse killing a child, even in a ‘mercy killing’. Besides this, hope runs the world. If we kill patients, we will never see miracles happen, and we will never get to study cases and make medical advancements. The cure comes when one’s soul is nurtured. We just have to take care. This is what we are supposed to do as humans and health professionals.
**The writer is a columnist and freelance writer**
