Terminally ill patients should be given the option of assisted death

Once again, the poll you have used makes a great point for my side of the debate. Most people want to legalize assisted death. However, as I stated before, they want it legalized because of the pain they are in, not to be selfish. Yes, they want to end their own pain, but can you really call that selfish? They are not only thinking of themselves. They are thinking of their loved ones as well. They don't want their family to see them suffering. As for your statement on rape and how legalizing it would make women more responsible, I don't want to even start on that subject and how appalling the statement you just said was. Yes, patients do have the right to refuse treatment. However, with a terminal illness, there is not treatment. That is why it is called a terminal illness. They are only given the medication to help with the pain, which will eventually take control of their bodies, and a respirator to help them breath near the end of the illness. When a patient wants to die with dignity, they usually mean they want to die before the illness takes over so much that they cannot do anything by themselves. As the lady in the video you showed in your last argument said. She didn't want to get to the point where she was answering questions with blink once for yes and twice for no. She wanted it to end before she got that bad. We are not sending messages to people with depression saying that suicide is ok. We are NOT talking about mental health issues in this debate. So many people think assisted death is ok compared to suicide because they are for different reasons. Suicide is done by people who are depressed or have another mental disorder that CAN be treated. Assisted death is done by patients who are terminally ill, in pain, and CANNOT be treated. People who are terminally ill are choosing one death over another. Let's say that you were suffering from a terminal illness. At one point, the pain will be so bad that no drug will be able to treat it. You could spend days in that kind of pain. What would you choose? To die before the pain gets so bad it can't be controlled, or to suffer with that pain for days and die with it? Assisted death would be a more comfortable death for a terminally ill patient. They won't have to feel the uncontrollable pain surge through their body as they are about to die. Somebody who is paralyzed can still live their life without pain if the paralysis is not caused by a terminal illness. Therefore they would have no reason for assisted death. Terminal illness has NO cure. So a terminally ill cancer patient would have no treatments that would work to cure the disease. Legalizing assisted death does not mean that they should stop looking for a cure for the disease or that the research would receive less funding or that it would remove the incentive to improve life. It only means that until the cure is found, we don't let people suffer in pain. As for the video. Every terminally ill patient handles things differently. That is why assisted death would be an OPTION. Not something that is forced on them. In the video in your previous argument, the daughter and son are not making the mom feel worthless. They asked the mom what she wanted. She wanted to end the pain. The daughter wanted what was best for her mom. She wanted what her mom wanted. To end the pain. Saying that the moms fear of answering question by blinking is not realistic is a lie. It is what can happen to terminal patients near the end. They are placed on a respirator to help them breath, so they cannot speak, or the muscles in their body just simply stopped working, so they cannot say anything. The parents gave the child the choice of heaven or hospital because the next time she got sick with something as simple as a cold, she would have died. If she chooses the hospital, they would only keep her hooked up to machines until she died. If she stayed at home, she could die peacefully in her own bed with her family. What she was told was not a lie. They were only telling her what I told you in the way that a five year old would understand. Even if a patient does not choose assisted death, their family will still be counting down the time they have left with them. The reason it could be so important to a terminally ill patient to decide when they die is because it could be a comfort to them knowing that they won't have to die in so much pain and they will know exactly when they will die. Yes, not everyone knows when they will die. But in the case of a terminally ill patient, they do have and assessment of how much time they have left. Even without assisted death, the family would still witness the terminally ill family member die. It is not something they can stop from happening. In the article I shared with you she is making the point that no one can make this choice for her. No one has the right to make the choice for her. It is her life. She wants to make the decisions about it. You said "The reality is no-one is making any decision to make her suffer, or saying she should suffer". When you do not allow a terminal patient the option of assisted death, you are making the decision for them. Since this is the last round I will summarize the key points to my argument below: Options the patients right to choose what happens in their life to end the pain it is inhumane to let someone suffer against their will statistics show that most people want to legalize assisted death terminal illnesses have no cures Just because assisted death is legalized doesn't mean you stop looking for cures * just to clarify, this debate has nothing to do with mental illness.