Lack of Palliative Care is a Failure in Too Many MaiD Requests
Romayne Gallagher When a person with a failing organ, stroke or other chronic life-limiting disease has persistent suffering that goes untreated, they can become depressed and hopeless. It’s a common pathway to severe distress that can lead people to request Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD). This is a medical error. The error is not in […]
How Bill C-7 Will Sacrifice the Medical Profession’s Standard of Care
Trudo Lemmens, Mary Shariff, Leonie Herx As Parliament discusses Bill C-7’s expansion of the Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) Act, one issue has been conspicuously absent from public debate, even though it has major implications for medicine and for patients: the impact of the bill on the role of the medical profession in determining the […]
First, Do No Harm: New Canadian Law Allows for Assisted Suicide for Patients with Psychiatric Disorders
Mark S. Komrad Canada just passed a law that radically changes the boundary between acceptable and unacceptable medical practice and has opened a path to euthanasia for patients with psychiatric illness who find their conditions unbearable. Unfortunately, this is not a new phenomenon. Several countries allow psychiatric patients who are suicidal to voluntarily receive death […]
Medical Aid in Dying: What Matters Most?
Peter Tanuseputro With the passing of Bill C-14, Canadians who are mentally competent adults suffering from a grievous and irremediable medical condition may now seek medical aid in dying. The policy has already resulted in ripples of controversy. For example, some large faith-based hospitals currently do not allow medical aid in dying on their premises, […]
Scheduled to Die: The Rise of Canada’s Assisted Suicide Program
Rupa Subramanya … When we think of assisted suicide or euthanasia, we imagine a limited number of elderly people with late-stage cancer or advanced ALS in severe pain. The argument for helping them die is clear: Death is imminent. Why should they be forced to suffer? In 2015, Canada’s Supreme Court ruled that assisted suicide […]
New Canadian Bill Would Let Doctors Euthanize Patients Who Signed Up to Die Years in Advance
David Cooke Saskatchewan Senator and former news broadcast icon, Pamela Wallin, is offering Canadians an unthinkable choice in her newly tabled Bill S-248. It is the choice to allow a doctor or nurse to kill you in the future. Under Bill S-248, if you are ill or disabled, you can sign an advanced directive that authorizes your healthcare provider […]
Why is Canada Euthanising the Poor?
Yuan Yi Zhu Since last year, Canadian law, in all its majesty, has allowed both the rich as well as the poor to kill themselves if they are too poor to continue living with dignity. In fact, the ever-generous Canadian state will even pay for their deaths. What it will not do is spend money […]
