Read the following passages. Underline the important viewpoints while reading.

Euthanasia: Life or Death Matter

Euthanasia, or mercy killing, is quietly being practised in some urban areas of China despite a lack of legal protection for the death option.
Helping to hasten the death of terminally ill patients is humane, said Cai Wenmei, an associate professor at the Institute of Population at Beijing
University.

Death should not be viewed.as a failure, but as a normal and natural stage of life, according to Cai. People have the right to die.
Death, Cai said, is as natural as birth and, like birth, is sometimes a hard process requiring assistance. It is unnecessary to artificially maintain
life beyond the point when people can never regain consciousness.
Statistics indicate that medical treatment for a comatose patient costs 26, 000 yuan a year, a heavy burden for the hospital and the patient,s family.

"Extending an incurably ill patient's life means the same as aggravating
his pain," Cai said.
Birth and death are both natural events, but the emotional impact and the personal meanings of these events are vastly different. Birth is usually anticipated with excitement and joy, while the reality of death is often avoided as best one can.
Views on death are changing in China, where a traditional saying is that debt is better than death, and doctors and nurses do everything they can to save dying patients, including the use of medication and life-support systems.

A survey of 200 old people shows that 92 per cent do not fear death. They do not want a long waiting period. They want to die with dignity and peace, instead of agony and degradation. Euthanasia is a progressive way to die, said a report in Beijing Daily.
Mercy killing can hasten the death of hopelessly ill individuals by withholding life-sustaining procedures so that death will occur naturally and quickly.

According to Cai, euthanasia can end the pain of terminally ill patients and can also be a great relief to their family members, both mentally and physically.
However, the general adoption of the practice of euthanasia would require changes in ethics and this should happen only after the issue is carefully considered by society.

Cai suggests working out laws on euthanasia to protect the practice. Mercy killing, generally induced by an injection of sedatives, should be performed only at the patient's request, with the consent of his relatives and the signature of a lawyer.
Hospitals and family members should respect the dying person's iights in regard to choices about lifestyle, including death.

However, it would not be right for medical personnel or family members to casually assume that a patient is beyond hope until a thorough
examination is made of his physical condition and of the effect of further medical treatment.
Hospitals avoid legal problems by requiring the patient' s family members to request the induced death in writing and by having joint approval of all medical personnei attending the case, including nurses and anesthesiologists.
Deng Yingchao, widow of former Premier Zhou Enlai, said that she is very much in favour of mercy killing as a practical concept.

Nevertheless, there is still a long way to go for euthanasia to be widely accepted because many people still consider it inhumane to perform mercy killing for a patient, no matter how painlessly.
According to the report in Beijing Daily, time is not yet ripe for drawing up laws for euthanasia because the concept will require complicated changes. Instead, the report advocates,education on death.