Ischenko, E.P. Euthanasia: pro et contra

Abstract: For the several decades the global community has been actively discussing the possibility for the legalizing euthanasia. As for the Russian legal doctrine, the problem of euthanasia is being concealed. Only the people who face the horror of incurable illness and the suffering that it brings try to find the way out from such a situation on their own, and usually nothing good comes out of it. Taking the above-mentioned issues into account, the author analyzes the legal issues regarding euthanasia. The author provides the brief analysis of the history of the problem, as it was regarded by Thomas Moore and Francis Bacon. The author then analyzes the points of view on active and passive euthanasia by Russian and foreign authors, and he provides the arguments «pro et contra» its decriminalization and legalization in Russia. The author provides detailed analysis of the solutions of the euthanasia problem, which were found in the USA, in the Great Britain, the Federal Republic of Germany, Italy, Holland, Belgium, and other foreign states. He provides detailed analysis of the Nancy Cruzan case, when she was for a long time in coma, being connected to the life-sustaining machinery, as a judicial precedent in the USA. He also pays attention to the conditions of death of Sigmund Freud. He provides examples of illegal euthanasia and arguments against its legalization in Russia, regarding imperfections of medical diagnosis, lack of studies of the bordering conditions between life and death, development and progress of medicine and pharmacology, the impossibility of making «death angels» out of doctors, as well as negative consequences of commercialization of medical services. The author comes to a conclusion that legalization of euthanasia in Russia shall lead to the irreversible criminalization of the medical system, lowering the dignity of medics, perversion of their professional duty and the greater social, spiritual and moral degradation of person and society. To permit euthanasia is to finally destroy feelings and connections among the relatives.

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