Physician Assisted Suicide Quotes

• Physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia have been profound ethical issues confronting doctors since the birth of Western medicine, more than 2,000 years ago.

  Ezekiel Emanuel

  Suicide, Doctors, Ethical Issues

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• We don't let animals suffer, so why humans?

  Stephen Hawking

  Animal, Suffering, Euthanasia

  "Scientist Stephen Hawking backs assisted suicide", www.foxnews.com. September 18, 2013.

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• I think those who have a terminal illness and are in great pain should have the right to choose to end their own life, and those that help them should be free from prosecution.

  Stephen Hawking

  Pain, Thinking, Should Have

  "Stephen Hawking backs right to assisted suicide", www.foxnews.com. September 17, 2013.

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• First of all, in principle, I'm against physician-assisted suicide, and secondly, I believe it is the prerogative of the federal government to control drug rules. And the idea of using a controlled substance to end somebody's life is something I don't agree with. I can see the idea of using controlled substances to ease somebody's pain. That makes sense.

  George W. Bush

  Suicide, Pain, Believe

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• Americans tend to endorse the use of physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia when the question is abstract and hypothetical.

  Ezekiel Emanuel

  Suicide, Physicians, Use

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• Patients who are being kept alive by technology and want to end their lives already have a recognized constitutional right to stop any and all medical interventions, from respirators to antibiotics. They do not need physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia.

  Ezekiel Emanuel

  Suicide, Technology, Physicians

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• What's important is that people give the kinds of reasons that can be understood and appraised apart from their particular comprehensive doctrines: for example, that they argue against physician-assisted suicide not just by speculating about God's wrath or the afterlife, but by talking about what they see as assisted suicide's potential injustices.

  John Rawls

  Suicide, Talking, Afterlife

  Interview with Bernard G. Prusak, www.commonwealmagazine.org. September 25, 1998.

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• By establishing a social policy that keeps physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia illegal but recognizes exceptions, we would adopt the correct moral view: the onus of proving that everything had been tried and that the motivation and rationale were convincing would rest on those who wanted to end a life.

  Ezekiel Emanuel

  Suicide, Motivation, Views

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