ABSTRACT
When medicine could do little to prolong life, nature made the decision as to when someone died. Today that is not the case. This chapter deals with another set of major moral and ethical issues related to the role of medical professionals in ending the lives of terminally ill patients. Specifically it deals with moral and ethical issues that arise when we move from the removal of life supports to physician-assisted death, and ultimately to active euthanasia, in which a physician terminates someone's life without their approval, an act which remains morally unacceptable almost everywhere. When death follows the withdrawal of life support the process is sometimes labeled "passive euthanasia" to distinguish it from the act of assisting someone to kill themselves, sometimes referred to as "active euthanasia". There are some states with Death with Dignity laws and other legislative activity for states without laws. Physician-assisted death and euthanasia are the topics of ongoing.
