Author: Le Nguyen
Besides the basic human rights stated by the UN, recently, an unrecognised right has brought up controversies among many people. This is known as the right to die, a concept in which a human being should have the freedom to choose to end their life to avoid suffering an inevitable death, usually by a disease [14]. Currently, there are four known forms of the right to die, including suicide, assisted suicide, active euthanasia and passive euthanasia, each is treated differently based on perspective and ideology [3]. Since there are multiple arguments for and against this idea, it would be essential to find out whether the right to die should be considered one of the basic human rights. .
Around the world, there are only around 10 countries that partially legalised the right to die, namely Switzerland, Netherland, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Canada, the US, Australia, and New Zealand [1]. Many diseases such as cancer, brain turmoil or Parkinson’s disease are almost incurable and often lead to a painful death [10]. Instead of struggling to endure the disease physically and mentally to no success, many people decided to choose death as a form of liberation. Additionally, the total number of euthanasia cases in Switzerland rose from 187 to 965 within 12 years and a poll in the UK stated that around 93% of UK’s citizens approved assisted suicide if the disease is terminal [4], this means that the mindset of choosing to die painlessly over staying alive while being terminally ill is becoming more popular in some developed countries. In these countries, the right to die also expresses liberty and democracy, as the patients get to decide how they want their lives to be instead of relying on doctors’ choices. Thomas More, a social philosopher from the 16th century argued that “facilitate death for those whose lives have become burdensome as a result of torturing and lingering pain” is an important factor to create a utopian society [15].
Evidently, most countries that legalised the right to die voluntarily are developed countries, where it would be important to display their support for the people and respect for democracy, which involves showing that they accept the right for people to take control of their own lives [15]. Since the rate of euthanasia is rising constantly, some countries believed it would be thoughtful to gain people’s support by legalising it, therefore keeping the country stability and credibility as well as reaching the ideal utopia stated by More. In short, globally, developed countries have shown their support for the right to die to avoid patients suffering from diseases and to show their library values to people.
However, most countries in the world have not legalised the right to die under any circumstances. This is due to the fact that many lethal diseases would damage the body to the point that the activities in the nervous system lead to depression, which leads to unconsciousness [2]. In this state, the patient would not be able to make the decision of choosing the right to die or not, which lead to some doctors concluding that no patient in unconsciousness should be taking euthanasia [9]. Moreover, the diagnosis of serious diseases is sometimes inaccurate due to human flaws, which could lead to a normal patient decides to take euthanasia and die meaninglessly due to a misunderstanding [6]. All of these cause difficulties to identify if the right to die should be applied or not in separated situations. Furthermore, some people suggest that some actions revolve around the right to die, including active euthanasia and assisted suicide are violations of the Hippocratic Oath, in which the doctor would swear not to cause harm to people [5]. Even though allowing a patient to die could be beneficial for them, for the doctor, it would still be considered breaking the oath physically. Despite having many different versions of the oath, the central idea of not harming others is unreplaceable, which makes many doctors go against the idea of the right to die [5]. From these points, it is challenging to apply the right to die in general and euthanasia specifically due to the difficulties in identifying potential cases for it and the transgression of the Hippocratic Oath.
In Vietnam, the right to die has not been legalised in any form. As a result, there are around 4 million people living unconsciously due to diseases such as stroke or heart attack [13]. One famous case was General Vo Nguyen Giap, who was a military hero from the Indochina Wars and the border conflict with China in 1979. He had to live fully dependent on medical care and was unable to move for the last 4 years of his life, against his and his family wishes. His nephew said that he has entered a persistent vegetative state for a long time but the government still wants to keep people from panicking by prolonging his life and convincing them that his health is still stable [11]. This meant that he was kept alive, suffering in an immobilised state by the government for their political gains, not for his own benefits. Cases like his are popular in Vietnam, with the people unable to die and have to live in pain for a large portion of their lives [13]. While they were suffering, doctors still had to spend time and resources to keep them alive, making it more difficult to save other patients who could actually be cured. This means that the introduction of the right to die would both end the painful lives of those who endure terminal illness and save resources for those who could still survive.
However, legalising the right to die would come with many difficulties. For many years, conflicting over inheritance money has been increasingly ubiquitous in Vietnam, due to the lack of clarity in the law system revolving around this. It has been exploited and abused by various methods, including faking mental illness records for their parents to freely alter the content of the testament [8]. If the right to die is legalised, it would be challenging to control whether the acceptance to conduct euthanasia by the patient is legitimate or not. A method that could be used by them is to bribe doctors to gain a fake diagnosis on their parents’ health. The serious corruption in Vietnamese hospitals would allow this to happen since up to 29% of the people had paid “additional, unofficial” fees to get privileges from the doctors [12]. This means that the doctors might also take money to create false records on the patients’ health, making it possible for the parents to take euthanasia. This way, the children who want inheritance money could indirectly murder their parents while violating no law. Even though the scenarios are only theoretical, the similarities between them and currently used schemes by people to gain inheritance are clear, making it highly possible for them to happen if the right to die is legalised. Moreover, Vietnamese people are generally stubborn and rarely accept any changes. This is due to the fact that keeping traditions has helped them from being assimilated with colonisers and preserve nationalism within them during wars and conflicts [7]. Because of this, most people prefer staying the same way and ignore changes to avoid potential failure. In summary, it would be difficult to apply the right to die in Vietnam without preventing possible exploiters and raising awareness to change the perspective of people.
From the arguments above, it is necessary for a country such as Vietnam to legalise the right to die since it would gain a tremendous amount of support from national and international liberty activists, helping it to grow toward a utopian society. However, how can we apply the right to die in Vietnam without causing serious issues?
Firstly, Vietnam should only legalise passive euthanasia, in which only the patient could actively decide to end their lives. This is to prevent doctors from violating the Hippocratic Oath, as well as incorrect diagnosis since only the patient could determine if the disease is causing too much pain for themselves or not. Besides the introduction of the law itself, the government should also raise awareness on the topic so that people could understand the intention, as well as educate people, especially elderly ones on how to protect themselves from law exploiters and abusers. This would prevent their lives from being taken for inheritance by scheming people. Most importantly, when legalising the right to die, the government should not apply it nationwide immediately. Instead, they should do pilot tests in a small area to see public reactions and constructive criticism from experts in human rights and medicine to alter and improve. Then, increase the size of the law to be applied slowly so that people have time to adapt to the change until it reaches the whole nation. This way, the right to die could be legalised effectively and create positive changes for Vietnamese society.
References
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