Opinion | Physician-assisted suicide should be allowed in Hong Kong, out of compassion and respect for human dignity
- It’s time to reopen the debate about assisted suicide for those who are terminally ill and suffering unbearably, in order to respect a patient’s own decision to end their life
We believe that physician-assisted suicide should be legalised in Hong Kong. Autonomy is an important value. We ought to be able to choose our career, religion and lifestyle – and when the day comes, a peaceful and dignified death. We should respect a patient’s autonomous decision to end their life when faced with suffering that robs them of their dignity. However, to avoid abuse of medically assisted suicide, stringent conditions must be set.
First, the patient should be terminally ill. Second, there should be unbearable suffering, resulting in deterioration in quality of life. Third, it must be clear that death is not against the patient’s interests. Finally, the patient must be mentally competent and have persistently, desperately wanted to die because of their objective condition. Only then does the patient have the right to request physician-assisted suicide.
In assisted dying, the doctor helps the patient, who takes an active role in ending their life. For example, the doctor might prescribe a lethal dose of medication, and the patient can decide when and where to take it. One popular argument against medically assisted suicide is the slippery slope argument: if patients have the right to assisted dying, why not go further and allow doctors to kill dying patients who are too weak or paralysed to take their own lives?
What about patients who are not dying, but who still have to face years of intolerable physical or emotional pain? What if crippling paralysis causes patients to become dependent on others? Finally, why not extend assisted suicide to anyone who thinks life is suffering and who is determined to die, like a 17-year-old suffering unrequited love?