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Terminal illnesses are a traumatic event for everyone. One day you can be completely fine, the next day you can be in pain. Nobody wants to suffer in their last days. People euthanize dogs, who are like family, because they don’t want them to be sick. Shouldn’t humans be able to have that option too?

Medically assisted suicide is a choice that should be available to everyone. It’s a person’s right to live and die how he or she chooses, and another’s beliefs should not affect it. It’s more of a humane way of ending life, when your body is no longer capable of functioning properly. After talking to a team of doctors and given every treatment possible, then and only then should the decision be possible. Doctors will help their patients die with dignity.

Assisting in someone’s death does not mean they were not given the best treatment possible. It means that they were treated and nothing is going to save them. The vital organs of the deceased could be used to save the life of another person.

No one wants to see an illness turn someone into a “shell” of their former selves. Patients do not want to die, but living as a shell is not what they want to be seen as. They want their friends and family to remember all the good times they’ve shared.

Haley Grebousky

White Haven