Highlights
- The Supreme Court of Canada judges have given Canada the most permissive law on euthanasia in the world.
- Evidence indicates that euthanasia is being used in Canada to eliminate the lives of disabled patients, as well as the poor and chronically ill.
- The roadmap to this disaster was created by the Supreme Court.
(Real Women of Canada) – In 2015, in Carter v. Canada, the judges on the Supreme Court of Canada pushed aside the heavy, heretofore, impenetrable door that had existed for centuries, that protected individuals from being killed by their physicians.
In doing so, the judges stated that this protective door would be pushed aside only in a few exceptional cases, and that a “carefully regulated scheme” could easily be put in place to prevent a slippery slope of creeping expansion and abuse of the law. This assertion by the court has turned out to be both foolish and untrue. It seems to have been based more on the judges’ desire to reach a “progressive” conclusion on assisted suicide, rather than on thoughtful consideration.
The Carter decision has become a roadmap to disaster for Canada, which now has taken the lives of 31,664 individuals between 2016 and December 2021, the last year statistics were reported. A Health Canada report indicates that the number of assisted deaths increased by 32.4% in 2021 over the previous year, representing 3.3% of all deaths in 2021.
READ: 23-year-old Canadian man’s assisted suicide bid thwarted following mom’s social media campaign
The Supreme Court of Canada judges have given Canada the most permissive law on euthanasia in the world. What is worse, the evidence is building that this nightmare is increasing. Evidence indicates that euthanasia is being used in Canada to eliminate the lives of disabled patients, as well as the poor and chronically ill, rather than providing them with social assistance, finances, and medical care needed to continue living. In effect, the government funded service available to those living with medical problems is MAiD, which fails to address the real problems.
Tragically, 1.4 million Canadians with disabilities now live in poverty. They are suffering more from their poverty than from their illness. For example:
- A 51 year old Ontario woman, diagnosed with multiple chemical sensitivities, was unable to find affordable, adequate housing for her needs and was offered MAiD instead.
- A 61 year old man was hospitalized in June 2019, lacking the intellectual capacity to provide consent and was provided with MAiD, despite concerns raised by his family and a nurse practitioner about this treatment. His application for euthanasia gave as the reason for his request, “hearing loss”.
- A chronically ill woman in Vancouver, with a genetic disorder, who wanted to live, applied for MAiD when she was unable to access proper health care.
- In 2019, a man in Chilliwack, B.C. died by euthanasia because he was depressed.
- A veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and a traumatic brain injury was offered MAiD by a Veterans Affairs employee when hospitalized. The patient never raised the issue with anyone before he was approached by the public servant to agree to his death.
- A disabled patient in a London, Ontario hospital was approached by a medical ethicist suggesting euthanasia, after reminding him that he was costing the medical system $1,500 a day. The patient had never previously expressed a desire for MAiD.
The above are only a few examples in which Canadians with treatable illnesses are being encouraged to accept death by lethal injection. Canada has now become a prime example of how legalization permitting euthanasia becomes normal treatment, instead of proper medical care.
READ: The horrors of Canada’s assisted suicide regime are finally coming to light
The following is the roadmap to this disaster created by the Supreme Court:
- June 2016, the legislation Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) made legal the killing of patients by doctors providing that death of the patient was reasonably “foreseeable”, or that the patient was suffering from unendurable pain which the patient believed could not be relieved.
- On September 11, 2019, a single judge in Quebec’s lower court concluded that it was “discriminatory” to limit the legal killing to only those whose death was reasonably “foreseeable”. Prime Minister Trudeau could have appealed the decision, but did not do so. He also could have just ignored this ditzy decision of a single provincial judge, but instead, used it as an excuse to remove the phrase “reasonably foreseeable” from the MAiD legislation. There was no legal requirement for Trudeau to do so. Instead, he took this Quebec court decision as an opportunity to expand the MAiD law.
When this amendment reached the Senate, composed mainly of individuals appointed by Trudeau, the Senators thought the amendment didn’t go far enough. They sent the bill back to the House of Commons to include in the MAiD legislation a provision for the mentally ill to be provided MAiD, despite the fact these individuals would not be able to comprehend what they were doing and could not provide a valid consent. Mental illness includes those with depression, schizophrenia, bipolarity, Alzheimers, etc., which are mostly treatable illnesses.
- On March 17, 2021, the MAiD legislation was passed into law, which included, as recommended by the Senate, that those with mental illness be allowed to be euthanized. Even the staunchly “progressive” Globe and Mail in an editorial, September 1, 2022, has raised concerns about allowing MAiD for psychiatric suffering, as it cannot be considered necessarily irreversible. It’s a guess made only by psychiatrists, and it can be wrong.
- Next up to bat in this scandalous business, was Senator Pamela Wallin (a TV journalist in her previous life), who introduced Bill S-278, which would widen MAiD even further, allowing individuals to sign an “Advanced Notice of Consent” to death, should they later be unable to give their consent. Wallin admitted that her bill was introduced because of her family’s history of dementia, and she wanted “peace of mind”. Her amendment may provide Wallin with peace of mind, but that is not a sufficient reason to proceed with such an extreme solution. The Senate narrowly defeated her amendment, but she is determined to introduce it again.
‘Advance Notice of Consent’
Advance Notice of Consent for Euthanasia is a quick fix for dementia patients, but in starkly simple terms, it means that doctors will be legally able to kill a dementia patient whenever they decide to do so, despite the fact that the patient is not asking to be killed. There is nothing that a family can do about such a death. It is noted, incidentally, that there is an enormous difference between a patient giving an “advance notice” that he does not wish extreme medically useless treatment when nearing death and an advance notice to be directly killed when the doctor chooses to do so.
READ: ‘Angels of death’: Whistleblower exposes horrors of British Columbia’s healthcare system
A ghastly example of “Advance Notice” occurred in the Netherlands in 2016. The patient was a 74 year old woman with dementia who resided in a nursing home. When the physician tried to kill her, based on the advanced consent, she struggled to resist the doctor who was injecting her with a lethal injection. The doctor then drugged her coffee and her family was obliged to hold her down when she continued to struggle to fight off the injection. The physician was cleared of all charges by a review panel.
More deaths to come
special committee of MPs and Senators has been established to review the MAiD law in Canada and will report to Parliament in October 2022. The topics for study include extending MAiD for mature minors and advanced directives. Although its mandate also includes a review of palliative care in Canada and protection for persons with disabilities, it seems that these latter two mandates have been lost, as the government appears to be planning a further expansion of MAiD.
The slippery slope of euthanasia continues in Canada.
Reprinted with permission from REAL Women of Canada.