Bill would change Ontario's organ donation law to 'presumed consent'

Activists in Ontario are raising awareness about legislation that would make changes to current guidelines and implement a policy of presumed consent for organ donation.

With this change, it would be automatically presumed that everyone consents to donating their organs unless they provide documentation stating otherwise.

Key Takeaways:

• A bill currently in the Ontario legislature would change a current organ donation law so that consent is no longer required but automatically presumed.

• Per the bill, unless a person explicitly states he or she does not want to donate organs, his or her organs may be harvested.

• In the U.S., an investigation revealed a number of organ procurement abuses, as organs were harvested from patients who were not brain dead.

The Details:

Bill 4 was introduced into the Ontario legislature in April 2025. As written, it would change the Gift of Life Act, as follows:

The Gift of Life Act currently requires that consent be obtained before tissue can be removed from a human body and used for therapeutic purposes, medical education or scientific research. Under the proposed amendments, consent is no longer required except from parents or guardians on behalf of children under 16 years of age. A person may object to the removal and use of the tissue prior to the person’s death or a substitute may object on the person’s behalf after the death has occurred.

Making a person preemptively create a document stating that he or she does not want to donate organs opens the door to the likelihood of abuses and a wildly dangerous slippery slope.

Reports out of the United States reveal a number of organ procurement abuses, with organs being harvested from patients who were not brain dead, as procurement organizations sought to fulfill quotas.

Why It Matters:

Presuming consent for organ donation can lead to a number of problems — specifically, that people may not receive the treatment and care they deserve due to a desire to harvest their organs. The dangers of such a policy were starkly revealed in the United States.

In July, Live Action News reported that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is looking to reform its organ transplant system after an investigation revealed many “disturbing practices,” by organ procurement organization workers. The investigation noted that these workers were pressuring families and doctors to allow them to harvest organs from patients who were not actually experiencing brain death.

Those astonishing findings led HHS to mandate corrective actions and social media posts exploded with comments from individuals stating they were no longer listing themselves as organ donors.

In Canada, the ethics of organ donation are already under scrutiny, as organ-donation organizations in both Ontario and Quebec already contact patients who are scheduled to be killed by their doctors to ask for liver, kidney, and spleen donations.

Canada now leads the world in organ donation from people who die by assisted suicide. 

Commentary:

At his blog, Alex Schadenberg noted:

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition supports the Dead Donor rule, meaning, the person must be dead before organs can be removed from a person. The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition calls for a re-affirmation of the dead donor rule and rejects a presumed consent for organ donation.

He has also linked to a petition that can be signed, opposing these changes regarding organ donation.

The Bottom Line:

It is imperative that everyone — including those who are sick, disabled, or elderly — is treated with the utmost care, compassion, and dignity. Removing the requirement for explicit consent for organ donation will only increase the chance that humans will be treated as profit and not people.