Two patients share a hospital room. By miraculous circumstances, both suffer from identical cases of late-stage terminal cancer, and both have firmly expressed that they do not want their lives to be artificially prolonged. Patient A has contracted a hospital-borne infection and will die rapidly if this infection is not treated. This being the case, the doctors decide to take no action, allowing Patient A to die from the infection. This raises the question: what does this choice mean for patient B? Should he be allowed to choose active euthanasia to combat his suffering? I will argue that there is no moral distinction between letting Patient A die and "killing" Patient B. I will do this by examining each patient's circumstances individually, then applying euthanasia arguments to their cases, and finally bringing them together to consider a verdict . While some may argue that there is a difference between killing Patient B and letting Patient A die, I contend that such claims are based on irrelevant reasoning. First, let's consider the reasoning behind patients choosing to forgo extraordinary treatment for their cancer. They have decided, as Beauchamp would say, that refusing to prolong their lives despite pain and suffering “does not harm or wrong [them] and may provide a benefit” (Beauchamp, 76). They “intend to abandon life because of its squalid possibilities” (Beauchamp, 77). The doctor promptly fulfills their wishes out of moral, legal and professional obligation. The choice was made to let both patients die, as a response to their “competent and authoritative refusal of treatment” (Beauchamp 74). In the case of patient A, he was lucky enough (in the most morbid way possible) to... ... middle of paper ... it's out of pity. Beauchamp expresses this eloquently when he states: “From a moral point of view, causing a person's death is wrong when it is wrong not because the death is wanted or because it is caused, but because harm or loss occurs. unjustified for the person” (Beauchamp, 76). The objection that killing Patient B is worse than letting Patient A die does not hold water, because that claim is based on the assumption that killing would be unjust. The doctor and patients have decided that death is preferable to life and that from then on there is no injustice in any possible outcome. Squeamishness about whether the doctor is responsible for directly killing Patient B has no place in the discussion, because by the time the discussion takes place, it would be like being squeamish about the doctor prescribing morphine to reduce a patient's suffering. patient.