An average of 105 people each day commit suicide. There is one suicide for every 25 attempts. The average number of suicides a year is 38,364. The highest rate of suicide for males and females is among those 45 and older.In our society, suicide is “never the answer,” I don’t believe this is exactly true. If you are of sound mind and truly believe you have no reason or will to live, you shouldn’t have to. Suicide is often concluded as a cry for help, but this is not always the case. People who are diagnosed terminally ill or are in pain every second of their life might want to chose their time of death.Dr. Kevorikian is one of the most renowned people for seeing our death as a right. He helped about 130 patients choose their time of death instead of letting them suffer, but was jailed for assisting suicides and served eight years. I believe it is just as Kevorkian said, “death is not a crime.”

All that Kevorkian did was help people not be in any more pain. If someone is in pain their entire life or if they know they will never recover, why should they be denied the right to end it when they choose to? If they are back to wearing diapers and can’t stand on their own shouldn’t they have the choice to live or die?

When people fail at suicide, they are often held for observation in a psychiatric ward until a doctor evaluates the patient as mentally healthy enough to not try suicide again or attempt to harm others. If they are released this means they are of sound mind and ready to get back in the world. However about one-third of people who attempt suicide will do it again within a year. If the person is released and proved to have a sound mind, maybe they really do want to depart this life and it is not a cry for help.

Physician-assisted suicide is finally being debated and becoming legal in more places. It is still being debated in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Jersey, Kansas, and Hawaii. It is legal in Oregon, Washington, and Montana. Physician-assisted suicide is when physicians provide the means to patients, but the patient performs the act of suicide themselves. This is what Kevorkian fought for and is now finally becoming permissible. Death is a right and the curtains of our life should close when we choose.