Death is steeped in human fear and superstition. Jurisprudentially, death has been treated in various ways, the most obvious of which is the criminal sanctions applicable to murder and culpable homicide.
The debate was recently revived by a decision in the North Gauteng High Court and a subsequent decision, on appeal, by the Supreme Court of Appeal as between Robert James Stransham-Ford and various applicants including the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, the Minister of Health, the Health Professions Council of South Africa and the National Director of Public Prosecutions.
Notwithstanding careful constitutional scrutiny of the applicant’s case before the High Court, both in terms of the applicant’s personal and particular health circumstances, the one conclusion to which the court comes and which may be of use to the supporters of euthanasia, is the need for a legal shift in order to deal more formally with the concept of euthanasia in South African law, more particularly, euthanasia’s relationship to the Bill of Rights.
It is a satanic issue...