Resource Tag: ASSISTED SUICIDE

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Using a community structure approach linking city characteristics & variations in media coverge, newspaper stories on physician-assisted suicide were examined. A nationwide sample of 15 city newspapers yielded 288 articles in a 4-year period. Correlation & factor analysis yielded 2 significant city characteristic factors: a stakeholder factor, age (percent over 75) associated with unfavourable coverage […]

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Although the change in law regarding physician-assisted suicide is both dramatic & recent, the basic arguments for & against this practice have not really changed since the issue was debated by Williams & Kamisar nearly 50 years ago. In this paper, the author argues in favour of Kamisar’s consequentialist framework. Any change in law & […]

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The file copy includes a correction published in the May 2005 issue of this journal.

Deitz comments on an article by Hall (1996) regarding nurses’ participation in assisted suicide. Deitz alleges Hall offered a biased discussion in which she associates an ethical level of care only with the refusal to participate in this practice. She says the journal needs to offer an article in support of assisted suicide in order […]

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This article presents the author’s perspective on assisted suicide. He questions whether money is the motivating factor in growing social support for euthanasia & assisted suicide. He addresses the perception that persons with disabilities have a lower, or no, quality of life & whether this belief also contributes to the recent emphasis on assisted suicide […]

This paper outlines how The Netherlands, the USA, Australia, & Canada have approached the practices of euthanasia & assisted suicide. Jurisprudence, public opinion polls, legislative developments, & the positions of medical organizations & their members are included in the analysis. A number of arguments for & against the continued prohibition of the practices in Canada […]

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This article examines legal restrictions on physician-assisted suicide in Germany where this practice is in principle a criminal offence. The distinction between active euthanasia & indirect euthanasia is discussed as is the intersection of euthanasia & assisted suicide. Judicial rulings & current legislation are included throughout the article to illustrate the author’s arguments. (60 refs.)

The authors first review the historical context that led to the adoption of Article 115 of the Swiss Penal Code in 1943. This Article provides for a prison term not exceeding 5 years for every person who for selfish motives encourages or assists in the suicide of another. The scope of this Article is provided […]

The legal status of physician-assisted suicide in Belgian law is ambiguous. The author of this article asserts that by not regulating physician-assisted suicide in the Act on Euthanasia of May 2002 the Belgian legislature missed an historical chance to clarify the legal status of this practice.

The author examines an argument against the claim some suicides may be morally legitimate. This argument appeals to a putative moral principle that it is never licit to assault an innocent human life. Related arguments in St. Augustine & St. Thomas are considered. Two possible senses of “innocent” are then explored. Mavrodes argues that in […]

The author states he was disappointed when he failed to find a serious discussion about why the right to life should be considered “unalienable”. He finds this omission in the literature odd since, by definition, a right to assistance in suicide implies a right to the alienation of life. Because he could not find any […]