It’s time to talk about euthanasia – 7/4/2023 – Juca Kfouri

By closely following the suffering of a loved one who, in a formal declaration registered with a notary, asked, fully lucid, not to prolong his life, I felt in the skin, and in the flesh, how necessary the legalization of euthanasia is.

In countries such as Germany, Belgium, Spain, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Portugal, the issue is well resolved and it is more than opportune and necessary to hold the discussion in Brazil.

How to hear, without feeling pain, from someone disillusioned, with no possibility of remission of the disease, phrases like “they won’t let me die in peace”, or “I can’t die”, or, even, “even dying is difficult”? Is there anything more inhumane?

And note that the medical team involved in the case fully complied with the so-called living will registered in the notary, but, from a certain point on, could not do more than the protocols determine.
In other words: she was prohibited from deepening the sedation to avoid psychological suffering, exactly what tormented her, in a confusion of images and heartbreaking words.

Someone will say that if we still don’t know how to deal with abortion, it will not be euthanasia that will enter the country’s agenda. Could it be.

In the name of life, death is prohibited, although, in fact, it only prolongs the anguish of the patient and those who accompany him.

For those who believe in God and, therefore, that only He determines the beginning and the end of everything, perhaps faith will ease the outcome for the victim and his family.

And for those who don’t believe? And for those who consider that the quality of life must prevail? For those who see and feel their dignity fade in the face of the impossibility of commanding the simplest needs? Who begs for closure and no longer even has the free will to resolve what despairs him?

There is obviously no doctor of law here, much less a philosopher. Only the brother dissatisfied with what he witnessed in an entire week of anguish without horizon, useless passage, at least, in the last three days.

No comfort at all, zero communication, just pain, pain, pain.

Those who remain start to live with the ambiguity of the feeling, because how can we hope that someone we wanted so much would leave?

Hence, it is urgent to take the civilizing step towards liberating doctors and patients for a life that is really worth living. And for the death that must be died smoothly, without shattering the route of the years passed.

Long life and quick death is the wish that rarely materializes. And if medicine has advanced to increase the expectation of one, there is little that can be done here to make the other possible.

The secular State must be above all injunctions and is obliged to improve the conditions of happiness of its people.

Denying everyone’s right to determine how they intend to end suffering is at odds with the 21st century and the Enlightenment.

That truly humanist pastors do not get in the way and parliamentarians really committed to their voters march in the direction, without fear of obscurantist patrols, of modernizing legislation so that each one can choose how to do with his own life.

It is impossible, in fact, to love your neighbor and live with martyrdom, even more so if it is avoidable.

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