In your editorial The right to die (TMID, 8 January), you raise the question of euthanasia. You ask whether people with a terminal illness should have the right to pull the plug and ask to receive a dignified death. You also raise the question as to whether relatives of a person who is in a vegetative state should have the right to decide the fate of their beloved one.

I agree with the points raised for the simple reason that I would not want to continue living if I know that my condition is terminal and that all the cure that I am being given is simply to prolong life with an extra day, week or month, albeit in a miserable way.

What kind of life are people who know that they are going to die soon living? Isn’t it better for them to be given the chance to choose the day when they are put out of their misery? Who is society to decide their fate for them?

I believe that, in a free world, people should have the right to die too. They should be allowed to choose to die without society pointing fingers at them or their family.

I have known people who were diagnosed with a terminal cancer who went through hell just to live those extra few days because, as yet, society does not grant them the right to die in peace. Their families have suffered tremendously as they see them wither slowly away. Why does society insist in allowing people to suffer so much?

You did the right thing in bringing up the subject which, as you said, has not been widely discussed in Malta. Yet it is about time that we follow up in the footsteps of other countries, which have legalised euthanasia.

P. Camilleri

Sliema