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CANADIAN EUTHANASIA ACTIVISTS HIJACKING PALLIATIVE CARE?

OTTAWA, April 11, 2001 (LSN.ca) - Liberal Sharon Carstairs, one of the foremost euthanasia activists in the Canadian Senate, has been given special responsibility for overseeing palliative care by Prime Minister Jean Chretien. The appointment, which occurred last month, gave rise to concern for some pro-life leaders.

However, the Catholic Organization for Life and Family (COLF), an arm of the Canadian Catholic Conference of Bishop's (CCCB) organization, has praised the appointment, hopefully only as a matter of political diplomacy. In an April 3rd letter to Prime Minister Jean Chretien, COLF chairperson, Archbishop Bertrand Blanchet of Rimouski, wrote that COLF "welcomes your announcement that Senator Sharon Carstairs will take on special responsibility for palliative care by assisting the Minister of Health." The letter added that "Senator Carstairs is well placed to take on this responsibility since she was the Chair of the Senate Subcommittee which produced the excellent report, Quality End-of-Life Care: The Right of Every Canadian."

Karen Murawsky, director of public affairs at the National Affairs office of Campaign Life Coalition, told LifeSite that Carstairs' political record and her professed admiration for the euthanasia practice in the Netherlands shows her to be a euthanasia activist. Murawsky referred to Carstairs' often reintroduced bills on withdrawal of treatment for seriously ill patients. It included "nutrition and hydration" in the definition of "treatments", enabling health care workers to effectively starve patients to death. The media has touted Carstairs as a euthanasia activist. In July 1997 the Ottawa Citizen said Carstairs and NDP MP Svend Robinson "have emerged as leaders to liberalize euthanasia laws." Moreover, Carstairs has herself admitted publicly that she is in favour of doctor-assisted suicide. The Vancouver Sun Oct. 2, 1996 quotes Carstairs as saying, "If we are ever going to have doctor assisted suicide in Canada - and I support it - then it has to be with very tight controls."

Alliance for Life Ontario leader Jakki Jeffs told LifeSite that when she began her euthanasia research almost eleven years ago, one of the fears then was that euthanasia proponents would "hijack palliative care." Noting Carstairs' record on euthanasia, Jeffs wondered, "Did this just happen?" and promised to closely watch the Senator's activities in her new role.

See the COLF letter to Chretien:
http://www.cccb.ca/docs/palliative-chretien.html

For more from LifeSite on Carstairs' pro-euthanasia background see:
http://www.lifesite.net/interim/oct97/17senator.html
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/1999/nov/99110301.html
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/1999/nov/991103a.html

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