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| | When Death is Sought
Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia in the Medical Context |
 | | Suicide represents an escape or release from that pain.(9) Contrary to popular opinion, suicide is not usually a reaction to an acute problem or crisis in one's life or even to a terminal illness. | | | In fact, hopelessness is a better predictor of completed suicide than depression alone.(16) Feelings of hopelessness and helplessness interact with the perception of psychological pain and the individual's sense that his or her current suffering is inescapable. | | | As articulated by a prominent suicidologist, the common stimulus to suicide is intolerable psychological pain. |
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http://www.health.state.ny.us/nysdoh/consumer/patient/chap1.htm
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| | ANA Position Statement: Assisted Suicide |
| | The profession's response to nurse participation in assisted suicide is grounded in the ethical traditions and goals of the profession, and in its covenant with society. | | | The nurse's caring approach assists patients and families in finding meaning or purpose in their living and dying and furthers the attainment of a meaningful life and death. | | | Nurses must be vigilant advocates for humane and dignified care, for the alleviation of suffering and for the non-abandonment of patients. |
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http://www.nursingworld.org/readroom/position/ethics/etsuic.htm
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| | l e a r n @ j t s DID YOU KNOW? Responsa: Assisted Suicide |
| | Rather than assist the patient in dying, the proper response to such circumstances is to provide the patient with a group of people who clearly and repeatedly reaffirm their interest in the patient's continued life. | | | Clearly, if that is what is prompting a request for assistance in suicide, the appropriate response is for physicians conscientiously to make themselves aware of their patients' advance directives and then to adhere to a patient's desire to remove impediments to the natural process of dying. | | | Protecting individuals' liberty, then, is more effectively achieved by making assisted suicide a socially unacceptable option so that individuals need not defend their desire to continue living. |
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http://learn.jtsa.edu/topics/diduknow/responsa/cjmag_asstsuicide.shtml
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| | End-of-Life Care Issues |
| | No person who chose assisted suicide had expressed financial concerns to their doctors, nor was pain associated with the illness cited as a major factor. | | | Further, there is serious concern that the availability of assisted suicide may create a disincentive to providing appropriate but costly medical treatments or to improving the quality and availability of palliative and hospice care. | | | Another medical argument is that requests for assisted suicide may indicate that improved palliative care, aggressive pain management, and better psychosocial support are needed. |
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http://www.apa.org/pi/eol/arguments.html
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| | Assisted Suicide |
| | Voluntary euthanasia and assisted suicide are rarely talked about, which seems strange to Westerners who have heard so much about the culture of ritual suicide, hari kari, in Japanese history. | | | Assistance in suicide or attempted suicide is punishable by up to five years imprisonment. | | | But that is not stipulated in Switzerland, although at least one doctor usually is because the right-to-die societies insist on medical certification of a hopeless or terminal condition before handing out the lethal drugs. |
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http://www.assistedsuicide.org/suicide_laws.html
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| | Alternative Sentence - A counterproposal to assisted suicide. By William Saletan |
| | The more Hendin explains about assisted suicide, the more it sounds like the early history of legalized abortion—the networks of sympathetic doctors, the allegations that they've become hardened to killing, the simultaneous public feeling that the practice shouldn't be prosecuted but shouldn't be encouraged, either. | | | Hendin says a study in Oregon showed that people who asked for assisted suicide when it was illegal had "an inordinate need for control." He's seen the same pattern in other suicidal patients. | | | Few patients who request assisted suicide are referred for psychiatric evaluations to screen out remediable depression. |
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http://slate.msn.com/id/2114344
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| | SUICIDE AND ASSISTED SUICIDE |
| | Nowhere is the concept of assisted suicide and the cruelty of making it illegal more pronounced than when individuals are unable to take their own lives. | | | The only thing that laws against suicide force one to do when committing suicide is use techniques that are either messy, painful, dangerous to others—or all three. | | | Our culture's taboo against suicide often keeps people who are thinking about suicide from talking about it. |
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http://www.mcwilliams.com/books/aint/312.htm
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| | Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia |
| | Opponents of assisted death express fear that the poor, the disabled, and the marginalized might be put under pressure to end their lives if doctors were legally allowed to hasten death. | | | But that suicide should always be prevented by whatever means are necessary seems as cruel and inhumane as the decision to do nothing would be callous and uncaring. | | | This includes providing medicines or other means the patient can use to commit suicide or by directly administering medicines that end the patient's life. |
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http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/asuici.htm
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| | The New York Review of Books: Assisted Suicide: The Philosophers' Brief |
| | But it is not subject to regulations nearly as stringent as those that a state forced to allow assisted suicide would enact, because such regulations would presumably include a requirement that hospitals, before accepting any request for assistance in suicide, must demonstrate that effective medical care including state-of-the-art pain management had been offered. | | | It is at least possible, however, that patients' knowledge of the possibility of assisted suicide would make it more difficult for such doctors to continue as before. | | | The most important benefit of legalized assisted suicide for poor patients however, might be better care while they live. |
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http://www.nybooks.com/nyrev/WWWarchdisplay.cgi?19970327041F
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| | Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia Informational Fact Sheet - FASTFACTS |
| | Assisted Suicide is when "a person takes his or her own life, but is assisted by a physician;" also known as voluntary euthanasia, which is "killing with the intent to relieve suffering" at the patient's request. | | | Undermines important pain and medical research, since it alleviates the necessity for developments in treating fatal illnesses and advancing pain management. | | | Is unnecessary, because alternative pain management treatments exist and are currently being improved. |
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http://www.reclaimamerica.org/PAGES/fastfacts/assistedsuicide.html
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| | Assisted Suicide |
| | Assisted feeding of some patients (those in a persistent vegetative state) is excessively burdensome because of the cost of care and the emotional cost to the family. | | | Rejection of lifesaving medical care is not legally equivalent to suicide because in those cases decided by the court none of the patients had a specific intent to cause his own death, but simply to accept the consequences of the life-threatening illness, "to let nature take its course" rather than undergo the burden of treatment. | | | It would not be classified as suicide since the patient did not have the intent to cause his own death, but did not want the consequences of loss of limb resulting from surgery. |
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http://www.all.org/issues/ie03.htm
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| | Pitfalls of physician-assisted suicide |
| | Studies have shown that depressed patients who request suicide freqently change their minds after their depression is treated, even though their physical condition is not improved. | | | When physician-assisted suicide is practiced, someone must decide who may commit suicide and who may not. | | | In the other two-thirds, the patient concerns are loss of control, loss of dignity, being a burden and being dependent. |
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http://www.physiciansnews.com/commentary/997wp.html
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| | Assisted Suicide |
| | In assisted suicide, someone provides an individual with the information, guidance and/or means to take his or her own life. | | | Under such proposals, doctors (or others) would be permitted to take actions to kill patients or assist suicide by providing information and lethal prescriptions. | | | Yet Minnesota is not immune from attempts to introduce the practice of euthanasia. |
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http://www.mfc.org/resources/backgrounders/assistedsuicide.htm
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| | Suicide, Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia. |
| | Now professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, she explores the complex psychology of suicide, especially in people younger than 40: why it occurs, why it is one of our most significant health problems, and how it can be prevented. | | | Understanding Suicidal Behavior: The Suicidal Process Approach to Research, Treatment and Prevention (Wiley Series in Clinical Psychology). | | | The Practical Art of Suicide Assessment covers all the critical elements of suicide assessment—from risk factor analysis to evaluating clients with borderline personality disorders or psychotic process. |
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http://www.psycom.net/bookstore.suicide.html
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| | Doctor-assisted Suicide? |
| | A second study, this one an analysis of a series of consecutive deaths labeled "doctor assisted suicide", found that in 52% of the cases the patients had not given informed consent for "suicide". | | | The policy statement goes on to explain that "it is critical that the medical profession redouble its efforts to ensure that dying patients are provided optimal treatment for their pain and other discomfort. | | | To those who have had to live through such an experience, the idea of doctor-assisted suicide appears to be, at first blush, a merciful alternative. |
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http://pages.prodigy.com/DOCTORINFORM/suicide.htm
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| | Physician-Assisted Suicide: Ethical Topic in Medicine |
| | No. Physician-assisted suicide refers to the physician providing the means for death, most often with a prescription. | | | For example, morphine drips ostensibly used for pain relief may be a covert form of assisted death or euthanasia. | | | The overall concern is that linking PAS to the practice of medicine could harm the public's image of the profession. |
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http://eduserv.hscer.washington.edu/bioethics/topics/pas.html
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| | Assisted Suicide |
| | The advances in medical science, and in particular the capacity of medical science to intervene in the natural cycle of life and death, have led also to a re-examination of many fundamental issues, including the protection Canadian society should accord to the values of sanctity of life. | | | Sue Rodriguez did not find dignity in such a life and wished instead to circumvent such an end by requesting physician-assisted suicide at a time and in a manner of her own choosing. | | | Her mind would remain alert, however, trapped in the shell of her body. |
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http://www.studyworld.com/basementpapers/sec_papers/Assisted_Suicide.html
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| | Longwood University |
| | Any serious consideration of the topic physician-assisted suicide inevitably draws from ethics and medical ethics, law, medical practices, philosophy, psychology, public policy, and religion as one explores questions surrounding the central issue of the right to die. | | | There are many vantage points from which to consider doctor-assisted suicide. | | | With the further graying of our country's population, no doubt, these discussions will intrude into more and more facets of our lives. |
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http://www.longwood.edu/library/suic.htm
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| | Online NewsHour: Assisted Suicide - November 19, 2001 |
| | As a physician, though, he says he'll be able to get whatever drugs he needs to assist him. | | | But early this month, Attorney General John Ashcroft directed the Drug Enforcement Agency to revoke doctor's licenses to prescribe drugs if they used those drugs to aid a death -- telling the Drug Enforcement Agency "assisting suicide is not a legitimate medical purpose. | | | There are important distinctions between intentionally causing a patient's death and providing, medication, to alleviate pain." |
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http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/law/july-dec01/suicide_11-19.html
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| | Open Directory - Society: Issues: End-of-Life: Euthanasia: Assisted Suicide |
| | I Want to Die - Personal story of a quadriplegic who seeks assisted suicide. | | | University of Washington School of Medicine: Ethics in Medicine - This site presents a comprehensive sets of QandAs about physician assisted dying, and two cases for consideration. | | | Assisted Suicide: The Philosophers' Brief - Legal arguments for the legalization of physician assisted suicide from the 1997 Supreme Court amicus brief by six philosophers. |
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http://dmoz.org/Society/Issues/End-of-Life/Euthanasia/Assisted_Suicide
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| | Kerry "Personally Opposed" to Assisted Suicide But Will Not Oppose Oregon Euthanasia Law |
| | I think suicide is the wrong concept or approach personally." In speaking about his parents' deaths, he says he understands why some families might choose the option of euthanasia for loved ones. | | | "As a child who's lost two parents in the last years, (I know) what pain management is and what proper treatment in the final moments and years of someone's terminal illness is. But there is a distinction between suicide and management." | | | Many abortion supporters, including Kerry, claim to be "personally opposed to abortion" but claim that the decision must be made on a personal basis by a woman and her doctor. |
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http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/may/04051903.html
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| | Wesley J. Smith on Assisted Suicide on National Review Online |
| | When people learn that the drugs used in assisted suicide cost only about $40, but that it could take $40,000 to treat a patient properly so that they don't want the "choice" of assisted suicide, the financial forces at work become clear. | | | For example, one of the most telling points made against assisted suicide — one which the euthanasia movement has never effectively countered — is that physician-assisted suicide, if it became widespread, could become a profit-enhancing tool for big HMOs. | | | They [i.e., the Catholic Church] believe suffering is redemptive and that preserving physical life is always valued higher than relief of suffering, no matter how humiliating and intolerable that physical life is. And they apply that standard not only to themselves but also to every Oregonian. |
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http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-smith052003.asp
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| | International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide - Home |
| | Addressing the issues of euthanasia, assisted suicide, advance directives, assisted suicide proposals, "right-to-die" cases, euthanasia practices in the Netherlands, disability rights, pain control and much, much more. | | | "Assisted Suicide and Death with Dignity: Past, Present and Future" | | | Extensively documented article about assisted suicide in the United States through December 2000. |
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http://www.internationaltaskforce.org
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| | CNN.com - Federal judge upholds Oregon assisted-suicide law - April 17, 2002 |
| | "But the fact that opposition to assisted suicide may be fully justified, morally, ethically, religiously or otherwise, does not permit a federal statute to be manipulated from its true meaning to satisfy even a worthy goal." | | | The government had claimed assisted suicide is not a legitimate medical purpose. | | | Jones ruled that the federal government does not have the authority under the Controlled Substances Act to prohibit doctors from dispensing drugs used to assist in suicide. |
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http://archives.cnn.com/2002/LAW/04/17/oregon.assisted.suicide
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| | Poll Shows Little Support for Assisted Suicide |
| | Utica, N.Y. -- March 2000 -- According to a Zogby poll, only one-in-three Americans, if stricken with a painful terminal disease, would prefer assisted suicide to letting nature take its course. | | | Respondents aged 18-29 and over 65 were less likely to consider assisted suicide than were those aged 30-64. | | | In the March poll of 1,031 nationwide, 30.4% of those surveyed would rather have a doctor put a merciful end to their suffering than wait for a natural death. |
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http://www.nrlc.org/euthanasia/facts/suicideassistpoll.html
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| | Loading Content... |
| | Opposes euthanasia and physician assisted suicide, promoting compassionate, medical, emotional, and social care at the end of life. | | | Site offers current news, legal cases and resources on euthanasia and physician assisted suicide. | | | euthanasia,right to die,mercy killing,against euthanasia,history of euthanasia,euthanasia statistics,euthanasia pro and cons,argument euthanasia,euthanasia mercy killing,die euthanasia right,assisted suicide,physician-assisted suicide,physician assisted suicide,end-of-life issues,hospice care,Oregon assisted suicide,Vermont assisted suicide,Maine assisted suicide,Hawaii assisted suicide,Kevorkian victims,right-to-die court cases,death with dignity,lethal injection,poisoning,advance directives,pain control |
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http://www.nightingalealliance.org
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| | Assisted suicide |
| | Clinical Problems with the Performance of Euthanasia and Physician-Assisted Suicide in the Netherlands, New England Journal of Medicine, February 24, 2000 | | | New England Journal of Medicine, February 24, 2000, more articles on assisted suicide | | | Oregon Health Division 2004 annual report on assisted suicide (3/05) |
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http://www.ortl.org/suicide.htm
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| | PHYSICIAN ASSISTED SUICIDE IN THE U.S. |
| | Does PAS actually increase pain of dying patients? | | | Other essays describe Physician Assisted Suicide in Canada, the UK and elsewhere in the world. | | | Permitted in Oregon under very tightly controlled conditions. |
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http://www.religioustolerance.org/euth_us.htm
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| | USCCB - Assisted Suicide/Euthanasia |
| | Physician-assisted Suicide: The Wrong Approach to End of Life Care, by F. Michael Gloth, III, M.D. False Freedom and the Culture of Death, by Richard Doerflinger, 2000 | | | Use of Federally Controlled Drugs and Assisted Suicide | | | Ethical, Legal and Social Issues of Assisted Suicide, |
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http://www.usccb.org/prolife/issues/euthanas
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| | Euthanasia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
| | After making sure the patient is in a deep coma, typically after some minutes, a muscle relaxant is administered to stop the breathing and cause death. | | | Also, Switzerland is the only country which allows foreign citizens to be assisted to commit suicide, even if they are not physically but psychologically suffering. | | | Switzerland is the only country in which assisted suicide is legal, even if it is performed by a non-physician, provided there are no selfish reasons involved. |
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_suicide
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| | O'Keefe Library-Best Information on the Net - Hot Topics - Euthanasia |
| | Suicide Facts and Statistics -- from the U.S. Nat'l Institute of Mental Health. | | | International Anti-Euthanasia Task Force--includes information on countries with assisted suicide laws, and their experiences, statistics on death and suicide, information on pain control, and on managed care/cost containment issues. | | | the Ethical Debate--Chapter 5 of a May 1994 report from the New York State Task Force on Life and the Law, titled When Death Is Sought: Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia in the Medical Context. |
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http://library.sau.edu/bestinfo/Hot/bioethics/euthan.htm
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| | International Task Force - Euthanasia & Assisted Suicide in Australia |
| | Philip Nitschke has expressed the view that assisted suicide shouldn't be restricted to just one subgroup of people, like those with terminal illness. | | | Healthy 79-year-old Lisette Nigot's suicide note was released by euthanasia campaigner Philip Nitschke who said Nigot was one of a growing number of healthy people seeking his help. | | | Australian MD to Make New Suicide Machine (ABC News, 1/12/03) |
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http://www.internationaltaskforce.org/austr.htm
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| | USATODAY.com - High court to review USA's only assisted-suicide law |
| | But in upholding state bans on the practice, it suggested that states were free to set their own policies — an idea that could be tested by the Oregon case. | | | The Justice Department says that "assisting in suicide is not a legitimate medical purpose" allowed under U.S. drug law. | | | By agreeing to consider the case, the court is stepping into a complex and emotionally charged dispute that tests a state's power to set policies for patients in the face of federal objection. |
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http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-02-22-court-suicides_x.htm
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| | EUTHANASIA AND PHYSICIAN ASSISTED SUICIDE: ALL SIDES |
| | One exception is the state of Oregon which allows people who are terminally ill and in intractable pain to get a lethal prescription from their physician. | | | However, helping another person commit suicide is a criminal act. | | | This is called "Physician Assisted Suicide" or PAS. |
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http://www.religioustolerance.org/euthanas.htm
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| | Physician-Assisted Suicide - Willamette University College of Law |
| | This site can be used to gain information on recent developments in physican-assisted suicide. | | | Each year is broken down into three reports focusing on litigation, legislation, medical developments, international developments, and other national developments for that time span. | | | For more information on assisted suicide please visit: |
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http://www.willamette.edu/wucl/pas
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| | ASSISTED SUICIDE LAWS STATE BY STATE |
| | In Virginia, there is no real clear case law on assisted suicide, nor is there is a statute criminalizing the act, although there is a statute which imposes civil sanctions on persons assisting in a suicide. | | | NINE states criminalize assisted suicide through common law: | | | Source: Associated Press.Provided by Infonet List is a daily compilation of pro-life news and educational information. |
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http://www.euthanasia.com/bystate.html
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| | US Supreme Court; Assisted Suicide |
| | The Oregon Death with Dignity Act requires that the Oregon Health Division (OHD) monitor compliance with the law, collect information about the patients and physicians who participate in legal physician-assisted suicide, and publish an | | | NYS Task Force on Life and the Law: 1997 Supplement to When Death is Sought; Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia in the Medical Context This supplement addresses the issues raised in the 2nd and 9th Circuit Court cases. | | | U.S. Supreme Court Rules on Physician Assisted Suicide Cases |
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http://wings.buffalo.edu/faculty/research/bioethics/court.html
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