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SOME MISCONCEPTIONS
In modern times also eminent men are not wanting who have advocated euthanasia, which in plain language means easy death. I am quoting from a review of a medical work which appeared in one of the leading journals of London recently :
"Doctors not infrequently end their lives when suffering from painful diseases.
"So says Sir Arbuthnot Lane, the physician, in a foreword to Dr. Killick Millard's "Euthanasia: A Plea for the Legalisation of Voluntary Euthanasia under Certain Conditions" (Daniel, 2s.).
"Euthanasia is a medical term for 'easy death.'
"Realising from experience how long they may be tortured and in agony,' Sir Arbuthnot continues, medical men sometimes telescope the duration of a life of pain and misery.'
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"He claims that he has never met with disapproval when he has advocated euthanasia before a public audience.
"Many, who have seen their relatives or friends enduring weeks or months of agony, expressed regret that the law did not permit the medical attendant to provide the sufferer with the means of terminating an existence which had become intolerable.'
"Dr. Millard's book is a reprint of the Presidential Address he delivered in October to the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Its author is the Medical Officer for Leicester.
"He advocates that individuals who have attained to years of discretion, and who are suffering from an incurable and fatal disease, which usually entails a slow and painful death, should be allowed by law-if they so desire—to substitute for the slow and painful death a quick and painless one.'
"There is,' Dr. Millard argues, 'a fundamental distinction between legalised voluntary euthanasia and what is ordinarily understood by the term suicide.""
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