Pro

“If a machine providing life-saving treatment belongs to the person who stops it, then even if he leaves it and returns to stop it, he is letting die [passive euthanasia] in stopping his aid. Does this mean that one will have killed whenever one stops a machine belonging to someone else (which one is not running)? No, for if one has the permission either of the machine’s owner or the person receiving aid to stop it, and one is then seen as their agent carrying out their will, one will be letting die…

Only a killing introduces an original cause> which induces death, rather than merely removing the barrier to a cause of death that is or will be present…

If a doctor actively assists an active sucide (either by, for example, giving lethal drugs or giving drugs to facilitate a patient’s suicidal act), he assists in killing…

The fact that the doctor must terminate treatment and we must allow termination of treatment, even when the patient and his doctor intend his death, does not show that it is permissible to… assist [the patient] in killing himself, or required of us to allow these acts, when the patient and doctor intend his death.”

1998