The British court allowed to kill a seriously ill woman, who wished to die

An unexampled occasion happened in the English legal practice. The British Supreme Court satisfied the request of the 43-year-old woman (her name was not exposed) to stop maintaining her life. As it was said, the client had a right for death according to the declaration of human rights.

The sick woman is totally conscience, and she can make intelligent decisions. The woman was informed about the award at the hospital, with the help of the video connection, so now she is allowed to use her life the way that she wants.

The woman fell ill with a fatal disease of the central nervous system a year ago. The doctors have been maintaining her life with the special devices, which were constantly supplying an artificial lung. The woman was conscience, but paralyzed all the time.

The court ruled that the doctors were acting illegally, but the latter claimed that their professional ethics did not allow them to listen to the requirements of their patient. That is why they are supposed to pay J100 to the woman as a moral compensation for “breaking into her private property.”

According to the functioning legislation, the assistance in suicide is punished with 14 years in prison, but the court managed to avoid this rule in this case. The court of the original jurisdiction refused to allow the woman's claim before, so she applied to the Supreme Court, where the positive award was issued in the long run. However, this decision became a precedent for other decisions of this kind. Almost the same hearings are currently taking place in Strasbourg, at the European court for human rights. Their client is also a British woman.

As it is known, the lethal injections are officially allowed only in Holland. This is the only country, in which it is allowed to “kill” the seriously sick patients, if they ask for it themselves. The upper house of the Dutch parliament voted for the legalization of lethal injections on April 11 of 2001 (we would like to remind you here that homosexual marriages, prostitution, the use of weak drugs were also legalized in the Netherlands earlier). The followers of the lethal injection say that it would allow to relieve a very sick person of never-ending tortures and sufferings. Australia, Colombia, Belgium, and several other countries are likely to follow Holland’s example soon.

The issue pertaining to the legalization of lethal injection was discussed in Russia, but the idea received a wild reaction of protest from the society and politicians. The things, which have been legalized in Holland do not come together with the Russian cultural traditions. Even if thinking about the legalization of lethal injection without prejudice, it seems obvious that there will be a lot of speculation on the part of those persons, who will be in charge of such decision, especially in Russia nowadays.

There is also a spiritual aspect for a lot of people. Vladimir Vigilyansky, a priest, said: “Lethal injection is nothing, but legal murder, the things, which have been done in Holland, are a natural result of our secularization, to which the world came in the 21st century. Legalizing lethal injection totally excludes the fact that God gives us our lives and takes them away into another world.” By the way, the precedent of killing the seriously sick people has already been in Europe. This was practiced in Nazi Germany.

Sergey Stefanov PRAVDA.Ru

Translated by Dmitry Sudakov