Explain, discuss and evaluate a topic in bio-ethics including the teachings of the three world religions regarding it
Bio-ethics is the ethical and philosophical implications of biological and medical procedures in which wider societal implications are considered. All three of the world’s major religions have distinct teachings on both abortion and euthanasia which are just two key controversial topics in modern day which are hotly argued about. Euthanasia is the process of suicide in which you are prescribed a life-ending drug by your doctor whereas abortion is the legal ending of a baby’s life decided by the mother.
It could be argued that Euthanasia is a necessary evil in order to relieve somebody from immense pain and suffering and therefore in today’s society we should make effective use of the advancements in the contemporary medical field in order to do the right thing and help end somebody who suffers a poor quality of life. However others may argue that we should be using such advancements to save life rather than end it as it is the morally right thing to do. Although the Christian religion teaches us to be compassionate towards the sick and elderly, as Jesus often did in the bible, it is heavily advocated that life is a precious gift from God and we cannot decide when to end it, we must live our life as god planned it and leave him to judge when it must end, otherwise we may be disrupting the natural and spiritual process that Christians believe death to be. No one has the right to judge the quality of another life as all life is of equal quality and therefore any increase in euthanasia in modern day may reflect the devaluation of life, making death more commonly accepted.
This is certainly the case in Holland where there is a slippery slope in regards the principle of the value of life as attitude towards euthanasia is very lenient and overall it is becoming more and more commonly accepted. Children as young as 12 are viable for euthanasia whilst 75-90% of cancer patients opt for it and 42 psychiatric patients were given it.. Laws are meant to be 'good' so euthanasia being legal 'numbs' the conscience but it is only making death easier and thereby slowly degrading the value of human life. There are many implications in society to be considered bio-ethically as well what with the negative impact on the patient's family and the idea that euthanasia only gets rid of the sufferer but not the suffering.
Despite this there are still many advocators of euthanasia who may argue that patients were a burden on the people around them, for example those who require 24/7 care. It is then their own choice, the utilization of their own free will to make a decision on their own life if they want euthanasia and no one should be able to take that choice away from them otherwise it would be breaching their human rights. However an argument against this would be that an individual may feel pressured into euthanasia if they feel like a burden meanwhile you can never be too sure when the next medical break through will arrival which may well save that person's life. Judaism is another major religion heavily against euthanasia as they believe that there are no exceptions to their anti-euthanasia law even if the person concerned wants to die.
This is because Jewish people believe the value of human life is infinite and one must struggle until his last breath. In Judges 9:53-54 King David had a soldier executed after he aided in euthanasia to show that it was no different from murder.
Similar to Judaism and indeed Christianity is Islamic teachings which also regards human life as sacred, believing that we should not interfere with the workings of Allah who has gifted us life 'And no person can ever die except by Allah's leave and at an appointed term' (Qur'an 16:61). However the Islamic code of medical ethics states 'it is futile to diligently keep the patient in a vegetative state by heroic means... It is the process of life that doctors aim to maintain and not the process of dying'. Therefore, unlike Judaism, there are some exceptions when it comes to euthanasia and some form of leniency but in most cases, they were wholly disagree with the supposed pros of euthanasia.
Abortion is another controversial topic for discussion even amongst the three major world religions. People who argue for abortion might say that women have the rights to their own body and should have the freedom to do what they want with it whilst they might also point out that the woman had been raped, which means that it was not conceived in the proper way religions teach it should be and therefor abortion is acceptable. However the Roman Catholic Church teaches that abortion is gravely immoral as it is not dissimilar from murder. This is because its believed that life begins during the early fertilization period of the pregnancy as this is the starting point for life to grow, a human being with potential rather than potential for a human being whereas others may argue that life only begins when the baby is actually born and so it would only be killing an embryo rather than a baby.
However this is heavily defeated by the fact that 9.7% of babies in the UK are aborted whilst alive with a total of 1200 in America. Babies are subsequently left to die even after living for up to 12 hours or they're burned, which completely contradicts the role of a doctor which is to save life, not to destroy it. Meanwhile 1.6% of abortions take place after the 24 week period where the baby is pretty much fully formed. An example could be baby twins who were born at just 22 weeks but still survived and grew up healthily, showing that abortion, in many cases, is the clear murder of an infant child. Other arguments against abortion consist of the damaging psychological effect it can have on the mother and the amount of cases where women were glad they kept the baby. There has also been research which proves that babies can memories music, showing that its not ok to inflict pain because their brain is active..
On the other hand, abortion might be acceptable if the mother's life is at risk and there are numerous medical implications that might over ride societal implications. This is somewhat supported by the church of England which recognizes that there are conditions where abortion may be morally preferable to any other alternative.
This is similar to the teachings of Islam. The Qu'Ran does not explicitly refer to abortion and so schools of Muslim law permit early abortion in certain cases but is otherwise wrong due to their belief in the 'sanctity of life', 'whosoever has spared the life of a soul, it is as though he has spared the life of all people', which shows that whether it is a baby's or an adult's life, all life is equal.
