Death is usually looked at like a sad, painful stop to a beautiful life, but to those who suffer from terminal illness, death can be a beautiful end to a sad, painful life. In America, a terminally ill patient has no legal way of putting an end to the suffering their disease comes with, but in Belgium, a law has been passed that gives its citizens this right.  Euthanasia has been legal in Belgium since 2002, but just recently has it become legal for youths to receive this treatment. This law has allowed patients and their parent the comfort to know that they will not have to live a life full of pain and suffering, that they can die a “good death”, which is what the word Euthanasia means.

Euthanasia is a medical practice of intentionally ending someones life to relieve pain and suffering. It is done in full supervision of, and usually administered by doctors, making it fully safe and pain free. It is simply a doctor giving the patient a lethal does of two medicines, one to slowly ease them into unconsciousness and the other to ease them into death. This differs from a similar form of death known as physician-assisted death. This is when a doctor gives a patient a bottle of different pills to take at home, and allows the patient to decide when and if they take the pills.  The pills have a similar effect as the medicine used in euthanasia, some of the pills are used to make the patient unconscious and the others to put them to their death.

Euthanasia is a safer and generally better practice than physician-assisted death, and that is because of the doctor supervision.  With euthanasia, everything is done with a doctor watching, so any complications can be quickly solved.  In physician-assisted death, the patient can come into a bunch of problems, with no one to help.  If they receive the wrong dosage of medicine, or they somehow don’t take all of the prescribed pills, they could be left in a worse state then they originally were.

With the passing of the law, many people in Belgium feel that it will create “death tourism”, and that euthanasia is what Belgium will be known for.  To combat this, the Belgian parliament have put in place a list of stipulations a patient needs to meet before they apply for euthanasia. Although no age limits are set, the law says that the child must display “a capacity of discernment and be conscious at the moment of the request,” and psychologists must test them to confirm they understand the gravity of the situation and what they are doing.  Minors need parental consent, and also approval from their doctor, saying the child is near death, and suffering constant and unbearable physical pain with no available treatment.  With these stipulations, there is no way a “tourist” could go to Belgium just to get legally euthanized.

Euthanasia is a seriously miss-interpritade practice.  They hear the word and think of people committing suicide, when in reality, it is very safe and heavily regulated.  Instead of being a practical social taboo, euthanasia should be embraced. For the average person, a law allowing euthanasia has no affect on them, but for someone suffering from a terminal illness, that law would be freeing.