Removing life support equipment from a dying person
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
The Shaykh says: What should be done if a person is on the brink of death, and his doctors have tried to keep him alive, but he is still able to breathe, so what is the ruling for the one who does that?
Answer:
Yes, decisions have been issued by the Fiqh Assemblies and by the Council of Senior Scholars that the medical equipment should be removed from him if there is no hope for his life, if there is no benefit expected in terms of his recovery. In that case, he is a dead man, so these devices are removed from him, because he may be harmed by them, and he derives no benefit from them. Also, there are patients who need them, so it is not appropriate for them to remain on people from whom recovery is hopeless, thereby depriving people from whom recovery is hoped.
The presenter:
Yes,
The Shaykh says: What should be done if a person is on the brink of death, and his doctors have tried to keep him alive, but he is still able to breathe, so what is the ruling for the one who does that?
Answer:
Yes, decisions have been issued by the Fiqh Assemblies and by the Council of Senior Scholars that the medical equipment should be removed from him if there is no hope for his life, if there is no benefit expected in terms of his recovery. In that case, he is a dead man, so these devices are removed from him, because he may be harmed by them, and he derives no benefit from them. Also, there are patients who need them, so it is not appropriate for them to remain on people from whom recovery is hopeless, thereby depriving people from whom recovery is hoped.
The presenter:
Yes,
Source
شرح بلوغ المرام من أدلة الأحكام [ صالح الفوزان ]، بداية من كتاب الجنائز — islamhouse.com (55:09)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.