The Living Will

Authors

Keywords:

Living Will, Legislation, Euthanasia, Orthothanasia

Abstract

The Living Will is a document in which one expresses his or her desire not to be submitted to a particular therapy in the case of a terminal illness. This article gives information about the national and regional laws upon which the Living Will is founded. By no means should the Living Will be confused with active euthanasia: it consists rather in accepting «orthothanasia», that is, the refusal of unreasonably prolonging the life of the patient, thus so avoiding any futile and painful life support. Living Wills suppose the assertion of the principle of one’s autonomy in the final moments of life in democratic and plural societies.

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Published

2018-11-06

Issue

Vol. 80 No. 315 (2005): octubre-diciembre

Section

Notas

License

Authors in Estudios Eclesiásticos retain the intellectual property rights over their works and grant the journal their distribution and public communication rights, consenting to their publication under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivates 4.0 Internacional. Authors are encouraged to publish their work on the Internet (for example, on institutional or personal pages, repositories, etc.) respecting the conditions of this license and quoting appropriately the original source.

Licencia Creative Commons

 

 

 

How to Cite

“The Living Will”. Estudios Eclesiásticos. Revista de investigación e información teológica y canónica 80, no. 315 (November 6, 2018): 813–828. Accessed December 5, 2025. https://revistas.comillas.edu/estudioseclesiasticos/article/view/9592.