Life

Active voluntary euthanasia is where a conscious, mentally competent person, usually with a severe physical ailment, loses the will to live. Many have said that keeping them alive is just prolonging their death, a form of cruel and unusual punishment. They may ask that life support equipment be disconnected so that they can die quickly, painlessly, and most of all with dignity. Most doctors are trained to try their best to defeat death, or at least try to delay it as long as possible. However, if the patient is hopelessly ill and prefers to die, the doctor may consult the hospital ethics committee, and take the patient off life support. When taken to court in these issues, the doctors defend themselves in saying, "I didn't kill her; I let her die." (Karen Ann Quinlan Case of 1975).This is illegal throughout the United States and the rest of the world, but it still is a common occurrence.

Passive voluntary euthanasia occurs when a terminally ill patient is in a persistent vegetative state (PVS) and the family chooses to take their loved one off life support. A PVS patient has no self-awareness or any awareness of their surroundings because the cerebral cortex, the thinking part of the brain, is dead. The brain stem, the part of the brain that controls the major organs of the body, still works, though. A PVS patient will never become conscious again after entering this state and will remain like this until death. The patient is not brain dead, however. Technically, in the United States, the brain is no longer Ð''living' when the brain tissue breaks down, disabling the lungs and other vital organs, and requiring machines to keep the patient alive. The family may choose to have the patient taken off life support if they wish, and if the doctors comply, it will occur. There was a case, though, where the doctor said he had a Ð''moral problem' in killing a patient that was a child. Because of this, the parents of the