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How We Die: A New Prescription, Martin Bienstock
How We Die: A New Prescription, Martin Bienstock
Journal of Law and Health
The dawn of the twenty-first century brought with it a profound change in the way we experience death. Until the last decades of the twentieth century, our bodies died all at once: when the heart kidneys, lungs, or brain failed, the body's other organs failed with them. Modern medicine now allows us to die in pieces, with failing organs supported or supplanted by technology. Modern death is different not only biologically, but also sociologically. Until the twentieth century, death was a private event that took place in the home with the family. It offered one final opportunity for family members …
Beyond Washington V. Glucksberg: Oregon's Death With Dignity Act Analyzed From Medical And Constitutional Perspectives , Steven B. Datlof
Beyond Washington V. Glucksberg: Oregon's Death With Dignity Act Analyzed From Medical And Constitutional Perspectives , Steven B. Datlof
Journal of Law and Health
This Article examines several aspects of the medical and legal debate on physician-assisted suicide. Part I describes the Oregon Death with Dignity Act, the only existing American law legalizing physician assisted suicide. Understanding the provisions of the DWDA provides a concrete, practical framework for discussing the medical and constitutional issues central to the PAS debate. Part II considers the wisdom of the DWDA in light of current medical knowledge and practice. The law allows a patient, with only a few months to live, a human end to intolerable suffering under controlled conditions. It is carefully crafted to ensure that patient …
Ancient Answers To Modern Questions: Death, Dying, And Organ Transplants - A Jewish Law Perspective, Stephen J. Werber
Ancient Answers To Modern Questions: Death, Dying, And Organ Transplants - A Jewish Law Perspective, Stephen J. Werber
Journal of Law and Health
To understand the application of Jewish Law to issues of death and the dying process one must first be aware of the importance of life, and saving life (pikuach nefesh), in Jewish thought. Judaism "attribut[es] . . . infinite value to human life. Infinity being indivisible, any fraction of life, however limited its expectancy or its health, remains equally infinite in value." The Mishnah teaches that creation began with a single human being to "teach you that to destroy a single human soul is equivalent to destroying an entire world; and that to sustain a single soul is …