12 years ago I published my own analysis, which might be of interest:
"Life and Death -- Moral Shades of Gray"
http://tinyurl.com/6dwry

Should an individual have a right to choose death for himself or for a close relative unable to make the choice? Should society be able to prevent such a choice, or to keep someone alive who prefers to die? Should society be able to require the killing of criminals or even of merely unproductive or inconvenient people? Should society, or individual people, have any right to make decisions about life and death; or should such decisions be left in the hands of God? 

There is a spectrum of stages of human life, from before conception to after death; and the larger moral issues reverberate in different ways at different stages.  It might be that all beings (e.g. animals) have fundamental rights in proportion to their level of sentience.