Withholding and Withdrawing Life-prolonging Medical Treatment, 3rd Edition

"The report bears three intriguing strengths: (1) The ethical argumentation is impressively clear, consistent and convincing... (2) The ethical argumentation is backed up by constant references to recent legal cases and decisions and to the latest legislation. (3) The structure of the book is highly transparent, the style is clearly written and easy to read, and throughout the whole book the reader is spoiled with precise summaries of the main arguments and theses. Due to these strengths, the BMA guidance paper not only provides a comprehensive overview of the legal position in Scotland, England, Wales, and Northern Ireland and advances the debate by clear ethical arguments in those areas that are not addressed by the present law. It also serves as a role model for other European countries which seem to fall far behind such an elaborated position paper and where doctors still muddle through the complexity of end-of-life decision-making in everyday clinical life...

... The BMA report should become an obligatory reading for any ethicist, politician or jurist who focuses on end-of-life decision making and serves as a helpful guidance for any doctor concerned with decisions about life-prolonging treatments in clinical life" - Matthis Synofzik, Tubingen, Germany, Med Health Care and Philos (2007)