REVIEW OF THE PHYSICIAN-ASSISTED SUICIDE IN THE UNITED STATES, GERMANY AND SERBIA

Öz

Abstract: Assisted suicide is the act whose manner of criminalization or non-criminalization varies from country to country, regardless of the continent in question. Special attention has been paid to this form of deprivation of life lately, with the medical assisted suicide becoming current. Medical services include a wide range of services that exist in the modern era of mankind, and, at the end of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st century, the United States brought about a special medical service, known as a physician’s assistance in committing suicide. The authors of this article primarily deal with assisted suicide in the legal system of the states where decriminalization of this form of deprivation of life came about. After failing to pass the law in certain states, the first US legislation that legalized assisted suicide was the Oregon one, which brought about the law on death with dignity, which was unique in the world at the time. Successful implementation of this law contributed to the decriminalization of physician-assisted suicide first in Washington, then in Montana, Vermont and California. After this group of legislations, the authors explain the two European legislations that have an entirely different approach to regulating this issue. Firstly, they handle the legislative system of Germany, where neither assisted suicide nor physician-assisted suicide is considered as a criminal offense. Then they explain the approach of the legislator of the Republic of Serbia, where they have performed research regarding this issue. The aim of this article is to explain and elaborate on the corresponding provisions of the law when processing any of these legislations, and then summarize the statistical data on committed assistances in suicide. Some of the legislative solutions are new, while about the laws in the other countries there are not enough literature in the English language. According to it, the authors consider that it is very important for the scientific community to get insights into these legislatures.

Keywords: assisted suicide, physician-assisted suicide, Serbia, Germany, United States

Anahtar Kelimeler

• assisted suicide,physician-assisted suicide,Serbia,Germany,United States

Kaynakça

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