Should you have the right to die?

If a family member had terminal cancer, would it be fair to give that person the option to end their life? In the world today, society can decide to put their pets down when their pet has shown no sign of being cured. So why is it different for humans? For years, Australia has debated in parliament on whether this issue should be changed. 

Lethal Injection
Source: Gallery4share, 2015

Dempster (2011) explains that assisting anyone to take his or her own life is a serious criminal offence. Obviously prosecutions would be pointless for the offender, as they would be already dead. For example, in 2005, Fred Thompson walked into a NSW police station and reported that he had killed his wife who had been suffering paralysis (Dempster, 2011). For sixteen years, he had provided 24 hour care to her every physical need and eventually, she pleaded with him to end her life. By agreement, she had taken sleeping pills and when she was asleep, he had smothered her with a pillow. Under the Crimes Act of NSW, the evidence constituted murder and Fred Thompson was charged.

There have been many cases like Fred Thompson and as a result has caused many advocates to reform the law in this matter. Miragliotta, Errington & Barry (2013) explain that government services such as health and police are run by the state government. Therefore, this issue should be a state issue right? Interestingly, there have been twelve attempts to get voluntary euthanasia through any Australian state parliament since Marshall Perron's Northern Territory Rights of the Terminally Ill Act was expunged by Kevin Andrew's 1997 Federal Parliament private member's bill and all have failed on the numbers (Chantagul & Ho, 2015).

Chantagul & Ho (2015) explained that Marshall Perron had made the point that the Australian Constitution does not over-ride the sovereign rights of the states to establish voluntary euthanasia in their own jurisdictions. Perron's NT law was expunged, because the Federal Parliament had the power to the direct the territories, their laws and administrations (Chantagul & Ho, 2015). The topic is so contentious that it is one of the few issues to naturally transcend political demarcation.

References:

Chantagul, H & Ho, R 2015, 'Support for voluntary and nonvoluntary euthanasia: what roles do conditions and the identity of the terminally ill play', Omega, vol. 70, pp. 251 - 77. 

Dempster, Q 2011, 'Do you have the right to die', ABC News, viewed 10 August 2015, http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-11-29/dempster-do-you-have-the-right-to-die/3702050

Gallery4share 2015, lethal injection, digital image, viewed 10 August 2015, www.gallery4share.com

Miragliotta, N, Errington, W & Barry, N 2013, The Australian Political System in Action, Oxford University Press, Melbourne.