Euthansia

Euthanasia
Student:
Professor:
Course title:
Date:
Euthanasia
“Is there a morally relevant difference between passive euthanasia and active euthanasia?”
According to Fisher (2009, 167), “euthanasia is the deliberate killing of an innocent person”. In general, euthanasia is classified as either passive or active. Passive euthanasia or ‘letting die’, is whereby medical treatment is withdrawn with the deliberate intention of causing the patient to die. For instance, if a patient needs kidney dialysis for survival and the physician disconnect the dialysis machine, the patient will most probably die fairly soon. On the other hand, active euthanasia or ‘killing’ is whereby the doctor takes specific steps in order to cause the patient’s death, for instance administering a lethal injection. In my opinion, there is no morally relevant difference between passive and active euthanasia.
In arguing that there is no moral difference between them, I mean that there is no moral reason at all of preferring one over the other. The sheer fact that one case of euthanasia is passive, while the other is active, is not itself a reason of thinking one as being morally better than the other. Both forms of euthanasia are morally equivalent in the sense that either both are okay or both are not. There is no moral difference between letting die and killing, and if one is objectionable or permissible, then so is the other. The plain fact that one act is an act of simply letting someone die, whilst another is an act of killing, is not a morally good reason in supporting of the judgment that the latter is worse than the former. The difference between letting die and killing does not make any difference with regard to the morality of actions that concern life and death. If a physician lets a patient to die, for humane reasons, then she is in the same moral position as if she had given the patient the lethal injection to die for humane reasons. In case th...