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Physician-Assisted Suicide: Where to Draw the Line?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2000

ERNLÉ W.D. YOUNG
Affiliation:
Stanford University Center for Biomedical Ethics, and Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Palo Alto, California

Abstract

In brief compass, I will touch on three of the central ethical and public policy issues that divide those who are opposed to physician-assisted dying from those who are supportive of this practice. These are: (1) the moral distinction (if any) between actively hastening death and passively allowing to die; (2) how to interpret the Hippocratic tradition in medicine with respect to physician-assisted death; and (3) whether physician-assisted suicide can be effectively regulated. I shall summarize the arguments pro and con with respect to each issue, and also indicate my own position.

Type
PERSPECTIVES
Copyright
© 2000 Cambridge University Press

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