Euthanasia[s1] , also known as mercy killing, is defined as the act of painlessly terminating the life of a patient who is suffering from incurable and painful diseases or those who are in an irretrievable coma. A lot of debate surrounds the topic of euthanasia as to whether it should be acceptable or not since it triggers different opinions from countries across the world. While few countries uphold euthanasia saying that patients have the right to die rather than live in pain, other countries disagree stating that euthanasia is a form of suicide or murder which is against the human right to live. According to D. Nerha, Kumar & S. Nerha, [s2] many people feel that euthanasia is like murder and that it should be illegal, whereas others think that it is acceptable and that it helps stop suffering of terminally ill persons and thus agree to the legalization of euthanasia (p 63[s3] [s4] ).
Euthanasia violates the norms and standards of medicine (Singer, Peter & Mark p[s5] 188). [s6] First, instead of taking care of a dying patient appropriately by controlling their pain properly and administering life sustaining treatment, physicians resort to euthanasia. Secondly, it undermines the role of a physician to the public and causes mistrust towards medicine as a healing profession. Thirdly, prohibition of euthanasia has served the physicians and patients an outstanding principle. [s7] It made physicians free from conflict of interest of choosing between healing and killing the patient while it enabled patients to trust physicians with their lives. However, this integrity has been messed up by euthanasia causing mistrust towards doctors and physicians.
In summary, despite the fact that few countries and individuals allow and agree with the practice of mercy killing, it should be resisted at all costs because it does not value human life and violates the morals and ethics surrounding medical profession. [s8] It is a threat to survival because instead of sustaining life euthanasia terminates it prematurely.