EDITORIAL
Ethics
Assisted dying: the ongoing debate
Department of Adult Medicine, Nevill Hall Hospital, Abergavenny, UK
Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr D Harris
15 Llwyn Y Grant Terrace, Penylan, Cardiff CF23 9EW, UK; dgharris@doctors.org.uk
Assisted dying remains highly topical and debated, both in the public and medical arena. All practising physicians in the UK who care for dying patients should be aware of the proposed legislation and the potential effects on their clinical practice.
Keywords: assisted dying; assisted suicide; death; euthanasia; palliative care
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
Physician assisted death is a legal activity in certain parts of the world but not presently the UK (for example, the state of Oregon following the 1997 Death with Dignity Act and in the Netherlands under the 2001 Termination of Life on Request and Assisted Suicide Act).1 Surveys suggest around 56% of doctors and 82% of the general public favour assisted dying.2,3
If legalised, it is estimated that 13 000 deaths a year may result from physician assisted suicide in the UK.4 The debate regarding physician assisted death is complex involving many legal, ethical, medical, sociocultural, personal, and religious issues.
In this article we describe the important provisions of the proposed Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill in the UK and summarise the arguments for and against such legislation.
Before elaborating on the Bill and for and against arguments it is necessary to clarify terms relating to assisted
CiteULike 
Complore 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
- Full Text
- Full Text (PDF)
- Submit a response
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me when eLetters are posted
- Alert me if a correction is posted
- Citation Map
Services
- Email this link to a friend
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Add article to my folders
- Download to citation manager
- Request Permissions
Citing Articles
Google Scholar
PubMed
Topic Collections
-
End of life decisions (geriatric medicine)
-
End of life decisions (palliative care)
-
Ethics
- Communication
Bookmark with
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
