Poorva Chavan
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Written By: Poorva Chavan | Published : May 13, 2016 5:10 PM IST
Euthanasia or mercy killing has always been a topic of debate in the country which gained momentum by the WP no-115 of 2009- Aruna Ramchandra Shanbaug vs UoI and others. The judgement of this case by the Supreme Court of India also laid down certain guidelines to be followed for passive euthanasia. In the same judgement, the Supreme court highlighted the distinction between active and passive euthanasia.
We all have our opinion about whether the death of a terminally ill patient should be accelerated or not for him/her to die a dignified death. And now, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on its website has put up a circular asking for public opinion on passive euthanasia. However, one should know that there are two types of euthanasia, active and passive.
Active euthanasia is where active steps like injecting the patient with a lethal substance that puts them to deep sleep within a few seconds and the patients dies painlessly in sleep. Active euthanasia is illegal in India. Passive euthanasia is also known as negative euthanasia involved withholding medical treatment or life support system which leads to the patient's death. It is further classified into voluntary where consent is taken from the patients and non-voluntary when the consent is unavailable from the patients because of his condition, like when he is a coma. Passive euthanasia is legal in the country without any legislation but certain guidelines/conditions and safeguard have to be followed.
After this judgement, a report titled 'Passive Euthanasia-A Relook' was prepared in 2012. The report proposed for making a legislation on passive euthanasia and prepared a draft bill titled Medical Treatment of Terminally Ill patients (Protection of Patients and Medical practitioners ) Bill. The draft bill deals with passive euthanasia and living will. The living will is a document in which the patient states whether he does or does not want any extraordinary measures to be taken to prolong his life when recovery from his illness is not possible.
Active euthanasia has not been recommended in the bill and is also not considered by the Ministry as it is believed that active euthanasia can be misused.
Now, the Ministry of health and family welfare is contemplating whether it should pass the law on Passive euthanasia and to make an informed decision it wants public opinion.
So if you have an opinion or have any comments about passive euthanasia, you can write to the Ministry at passiveeuthanasia@gmail.com. You must send your comments before the 19th of June 2016. You can read all the provisions of the bill here.
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