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Doctors who support Canada's 'assisted dying' regime say it's gone too far
Two psychiatrists have penned an op-ed in the The New York Times explaining why they no longer fully support Canada's Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) program, saying that it is no longer the "last resort" it was meant to be.
Two psychiatrists say that while they support assisted suicide and euthanasia, they fear requirements have become too lax in Canada.
In an essay for the New York Times, the doctors said "[t]oo many people are receiving the procedure without the opportunity for careful reflection about it with a health provider. In some cases, patients are being approved who should not be," like in cases of poverty or loneliness.
Doctors are allegedly under pressure to push assisted suicide on patients as a means of cost savings.
Though the psychiatrists don't believe assisted suicide should be available to anyone who wants it, they still support assisted dying for certain people.
Dr. Gary Rodin and Dr. Madeline Li are professors of psychiatry at the University of Toronto. They both work with patients who have advanced stage cancer, and said that MAiD is a frequent topic of conversation as they counsel patients. One of the doctors (they don't say which) has committed euthanasia on patients.
While they both still see assisted suicide and euthanasia as "dignified and profoundly meaningful," they now believe that "[t]oo many people are receiving the procedure without the opportunity for careful reflection about it with a health provider. In some cases, patients are being approved who should not be."
They continued, "Reports have emerged of people seeking assisted death in the context of poverty or loneliness, raising concerns that they may feel they have no other options."
Assisted suicide was meant to be "an option only for patients with a 'reasonably foreseeable' natural death, but in 2021, Parliament removed the 'foreseeable death requirement.' Now, Canada's MAiD is "one of the most permissive in the world, allowing assisted dying for almost any form of subjectively intolerable suffering that has a medical basis, or even for medically unexplained physical symptoms," wrote Li and Rodin.
Since then, Canada has reached the fastest growing rate of assisted death in the world.
Rodin and Li believe that the effort to make assisted suicide and euthanasia a human right has led to the drastic number of people applying for assisted suicide.
Any law that prevents a person who wants to die from being approved for death is seen as interfering with a person's autonomy. If a person says they are experiencing intolerable suffering, how could a doctor tell them otherwise?
Rodin and Li explain:
A study published earlier this year looked at how Canadian physicians involved in medical assistance in dying understood their role. One provider described being “just a conduit really for someone’s desires and someone’s choices.”
In a separate but similar study, another provider professed to have no role in evaluating suffering — though one of the legal requirements to receive the procedure is that a clinician must confirm that the patient is experiencing intolerable suffering.
Determining that degree of suffering “is entirely up to the patient — 100 percent,” that provider said.
Rodin and Li, however, think that despite the rights of patients to make decisions about their health, "doctors have an important role in guiding those decisions." They wrote:
"There is an old saying about surgeons that is apt here: Good ones know how to operate, better ones know when to operate, and the best know when not to."
The MAiD law requires that a person's request be approved by two clinicians, either a doctor or nurse practitioner.
On Track 1, the patient must have an illness that will cause a "reasonably foreseeable death." Sometimes a person can be approved for and undergo euthanasia on the same day.
On Track 2, the person does not have to have an illness that will cause foreseeable death. After approval, they must wait 90 days to die.
There is no requirement for conversation or reflection between the patient and the clinicians, or that the patients attempt a treatment of any kind, even if one is available.
Yet Li and Rodin wrote:
We’ve seen how beneficial it is to pause and reflect with our own patients. One of them, a woman in her 70s, was the matriarch of her family, the one who made Sunday dinners. She sought and received approval for assisted dying after she lost the ability to cook. She felt she had lost her value to her family.
Through counseling, she came to understand that her family valued who she was, not what she did for them. She decided not to go through with ending her life, at least for now. That Christmas, her family gathered and she sat proudly at the table, while others did the cooking and serving.
They asked whether Canada has "done enough to help people sustain their sense of dignity and meaning in life. Death must not become the only kind of relief people can imagine."
Rodin and Li made valid points. Doctors should be doing more in Canada to discuss assisted suicide with patients and assess them for mental health concerns.
However, doctors are allegedly under pressure to push assisted suicide on patients as a means of cost savings.
And though Rodin and Li don't believe assisted suicide should be available to anyone who wants it, they still support assisted dying for certain people — certain people they deem acceptable cases for death.
As a society, many consider suicide a tragedy when the person who dies is young, healthy, and able-bodied. That's what Rodin and Li are essentially saying: that certain sick people should not be allowed to undergo assisted suicide.
The question is, does the world see that as discrimination against seriously ill individuals, or discrimination against everyone else?
Suicide is tragic, no matter who chooses to end his or her own life.
Legalized assisted suicide and euthanasia are discriminatory, eugenic acts against the sick, elderly, and disabled. Canada seems to want to end that discrimination by allowing anyone who feels they are suffering to access assisted suicide.
Instead, we should end that discrimination by disallowing assisted suicide and euthanasia for everyone, because no human should be told that their life is no longer of value or worth living.
Every human life has meaning and purpose, from fertilization to natural death.
Live Action News is pro-life news and commentary from a pro-life perspective.
Our work is possible because of our donors. Please consider giving to further our work of changing hearts and minds on issues of life and human dignity.
Contact editor@liveaction.org for questions, corrections, or if you are seeking permission to reprint any Live Action News content.
Guest Articles: To submit a guest article to Live Action News, email editor@liveaction.org with an attached Word document of 800-1000 words. Please also attach any photos relevant to your submission if applicable. If your submission is accepted for publication, you will be notified within three weeks. Guest articles are not compensated (see our Open License Agreement). Thank you for your interest in Live Action News!
Bridget Sielicki
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·International·By Nancy Flanders
Doctors who support Canada's 'assisted dying' regime say it's gone too far
Two psychiatrists have penned an op-ed in the The New York Times explaining why they no longer fully support Canada's Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) program, saying that it is no longer the "last resort" it was meant to be.
Two psychiatrists say that while they support assisted suicide and euthanasia, they fear requirements have become too lax in Canada.
In an essay for the New York Times, the doctors said "[t]oo many people are receiving the procedure without the opportunity for careful reflection about it with a health provider. In some cases, patients are being approved who should not be," like in cases of poverty or loneliness.
Doctors are allegedly under pressure to push assisted suicide on patients as a means of cost savings.
Though the psychiatrists don't believe assisted suicide should be available to anyone who wants it, they still support assisted dying for certain people.
Dr. Gary Rodin and Dr. Madeline Li are professors of psychiatry at the University of Toronto. They both work with patients who have advanced stage cancer, and said that MAiD is a frequent topic of conversation as they counsel patients. One of the doctors (they don't say which) has committed euthanasia on patients.
While they both still see assisted suicide and euthanasia as "dignified and profoundly meaningful," they now believe that "[t]oo many people are receiving the procedure without the opportunity for careful reflection about it with a health provider. In some cases, patients are being approved who should not be."
They continued, "Reports have emerged of people seeking assisted death in the context of poverty or loneliness, raising concerns that they may feel they have no other options."
Assisted suicide was meant to be "an option only for patients with a 'reasonably foreseeable' natural death, but in 2021, Parliament removed the 'foreseeable death requirement.' Now, Canada's MAiD is "one of the most permissive in the world, allowing assisted dying for almost any form of subjectively intolerable suffering that has a medical basis, or even for medically unexplained physical symptoms," wrote Li and Rodin.
Since then, Canada has reached the fastest growing rate of assisted death in the world.
Rodin and Li believe that the effort to make assisted suicide and euthanasia a human right has led to the drastic number of people applying for assisted suicide.
Any law that prevents a person who wants to die from being approved for death is seen as interfering with a person's autonomy. If a person says they are experiencing intolerable suffering, how could a doctor tell them otherwise?
Rodin and Li explain:
A study published earlier this year looked at how Canadian physicians involved in medical assistance in dying understood their role. One provider described being “just a conduit really for someone’s desires and someone’s choices.”
In a separate but similar study, another provider professed to have no role in evaluating suffering — though one of the legal requirements to receive the procedure is that a clinician must confirm that the patient is experiencing intolerable suffering.
Determining that degree of suffering “is entirely up to the patient — 100 percent,” that provider said.
Rodin and Li, however, think that despite the rights of patients to make decisions about their health, "doctors have an important role in guiding those decisions." They wrote:
"There is an old saying about surgeons that is apt here: Good ones know how to operate, better ones know when to operate, and the best know when not to."
The MAiD law requires that a person's request be approved by two clinicians, either a doctor or nurse practitioner.
On Track 1, the patient must have an illness that will cause a "reasonably foreseeable death." Sometimes a person can be approved for and undergo euthanasia on the same day.
On Track 2, the person does not have to have an illness that will cause foreseeable death. After approval, they must wait 90 days to die.
There is no requirement for conversation or reflection between the patient and the clinicians, or that the patients attempt a treatment of any kind, even if one is available.
Yet Li and Rodin wrote:
We’ve seen how beneficial it is to pause and reflect with our own patients. One of them, a woman in her 70s, was the matriarch of her family, the one who made Sunday dinners. She sought and received approval for assisted dying after she lost the ability to cook. She felt she had lost her value to her family.
Through counseling, she came to understand that her family valued who she was, not what she did for them. She decided not to go through with ending her life, at least for now. That Christmas, her family gathered and she sat proudly at the table, while others did the cooking and serving.
They asked whether Canada has "done enough to help people sustain their sense of dignity and meaning in life. Death must not become the only kind of relief people can imagine."
Rodin and Li made valid points. Doctors should be doing more in Canada to discuss assisted suicide with patients and assess them for mental health concerns.
However, doctors are allegedly under pressure to push assisted suicide on patients as a means of cost savings.
And though Rodin and Li don't believe assisted suicide should be available to anyone who wants it, they still support assisted dying for certain people — certain people they deem acceptable cases for death.
As a society, many consider suicide a tragedy when the person who dies is young, healthy, and able-bodied. That's what Rodin and Li are essentially saying: that certain sick people should not be allowed to undergo assisted suicide.
The question is, does the world see that as discrimination against seriously ill individuals, or discrimination against everyone else?
Suicide is tragic, no matter who chooses to end his or her own life.
Legalized assisted suicide and euthanasia are discriminatory, eugenic acts against the sick, elderly, and disabled. Canada seems to want to end that discrimination by allowing anyone who feels they are suffering to access assisted suicide.
Instead, we should end that discrimination by disallowing assisted suicide and euthanasia for everyone, because no human should be told that their life is no longer of value or worth living.
Every human life has meaning and purpose, from fertilization to natural death.
Live Action News is pro-life news and commentary from a pro-life perspective.
Our work is possible because of our donors. Please consider giving to further our work of changing hearts and minds on issues of life and human dignity.
Contact editor@liveaction.org for questions, corrections, or if you are seeking permission to reprint any Live Action News content.
Guest Articles: To submit a guest article to Live Action News, email editor@liveaction.org with an attached Word document of 800-1000 words. Please also attach any photos relevant to your submission if applicable. If your submission is accepted for publication, you will be notified within three weeks. Guest articles are not compensated (see our Open License Agreement). Thank you for your interest in Live Action News!
Bridget Sielicki
·Abortion Pill
Bridget Sielicki
·International
Nancy Flanders
·International
Cassy Cooke
·Politics
Right to Life UK
·International
Cassy Cooke
·Politics
Nancy Flanders
·International
Nancy Flanders
·Issues
Nancy Flanders
·Politics
Nancy Flanders
·International
Nancy Flanders
·