Canada has postponed a plan to offer assisted suicide to people suffering solely from mental illness, health officials announced.
The controversial policy, which critics feared would lead people to commit suicide out of desperation, currently allows anyone in Canada with an incurable medical condition to die, even if the disease is not terminal.
The country’s legislation on medically assisted dying is among the most liberal in the world. In 2022 alone, approximately 13,000 Canadians were euthanized as part of the program.
However, health officials said Monday that there are not enough doctors, especially psychiatrists, in the country to assess mentally ill people who want to die.
The delay comes as Boston Globe columnist Kevin Cullen comes under fire for signing a legal memorandum to help a retired nurse die by assisted suicide before writing about the experience.
Canada’s medically assisted dying law is one of the most liberal in the world. In 2022 alone, approximately 13,000 Canadians were euthanized as part of the program
Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) program offers people the option to end their lives if they experience an incurable disease. It is intended to be extended to people with mental health conditions, but that has been delayed
Mark Holland, Canada’s health minister, said: “The system has to be ready, and we have to get it right.”
‘It is clear from the conversations we have had that the system is not ready yet and that we need more time.’
“While the curriculum is in place and guidelines have been established, there hasn’t been enough time to train people on it, and provinces and territories say their systems are not ready and need more time.”
Officials did not provide a timeline for the latest extension. Prior to this delay, the expansion was scheduled to come into effect on March 17.
Dying with Dignity Canada, a group that advocates for the right to medically assisted dying, said it was “disheartened” by the delay.
Medically assisted dying (MAiD) was first introduced in 2015 after Canada’s Supreme Court ruled that requiring people to cope with unbearable suffering violated their right to liberty and security.
Adopted in June 2016, only people with a terminal illness where death from natural causes was reasonably foreseeable – known as Track One patients – were eligible for MAiD.
Lynda Bluestein, 76, traveled from Connecticut to Vermont earlier this month to end her life by taking prescription lethal drugs
Boston Globe journalist Kevin Cullen signed a form showing that Ms. Bluestein was lucid in her mind
But in March 2021, legislation was updated to create Track Two patients. These are defined as people suffering from an ‘intolerable’ and ‘irreversible’ illness or disability and who may not yet be close to death from natural causes.
In 2022, data showed 13,241 people chose MAiD to die, a 31 percent increase from 2021. This accounted for one in every twenty Canadian deaths.
The controversial policy, which has some concerned people will commit suicide out of desperation, was further updated in December 2022 so that people seeking MAiD to end their lives solely due to mental illness would be eligible before the March 2024 delay .
From now on, to qualify for MAiD, people must meet all the criteria: be eligible for government-funded health services; be at least 18 years old and considered mentally competent; has an irreversible medical condition – a condition that is irreversible, in an advanced stage and causing unbearable physical or mental suffering – makes a voluntary request for death; and give informed consent to receive medical attention to end your life.
There are two methods MAiD uses to end someone’s life.
In the first case, a doctor or nurse administers a drug that causes death.
In the second case, a doctor or nurse prescribes a medication to a patient that he or she takes himself or herself.
Medications used in MAiD deaths are often medications that healthcare providers already use for other purposes, but in much lower doses, such as pain management, anesthesia, and nausea.
Tracey Thompson, 55, pictured above before contracting Covid-19 (left) and after her illness (right)
Ms Thompson in hospital in March 2022. She contracted Covid-19 in March 2020, developed a sore throat and lost her sense of taste and smell
Kevin Cullen, a columnist at the Boston Globe, came under fire this week after it emerged that he signed a legal memorandum that helped a retired nurse die by assisted suicide before writing about the experience.
Lynda Bluestein, 76, traveled from Connecticut to Vermont to take her own life earlier this month after battling cancer, which Mr. Cullen chronicled for the Globe.
It has since emerged that Mr Cullen not only witnessed the event, but also signed a form proving Ms Bluestein was in a lucid state of mind when she decided to die.
There is no evidence that Cullen broke the law, but critics are now questioning the ethics of his decision.
Vermont is the first state in the country to change its laws so that non-residents can use the law to die there.
There are ten states that allow medically assisted suicide.
Tracey Thompson, a 55-year-old former chef in Toronto, filed for euthanasia last year after a battle with long Covid left her bedridden and unemployed.
She told DailyMail.com last month that she had been deprived of life’s simple pleasures: she is too weak to cook, too nauseous to eat and cannot listen to music, read or watch films because her brain fog is so severe that she ‘can’t process the information.’
In the almost four years she has been suffering from her illness, she has not been able to work and her savings have run out. She also has no family to speak of and has lost all her friends.
“My quality of life with this disease is almost non-existent, it’s not a good life,” she said. ‘I do nothing. It’s painfully boring. It’s extremely isolating.’
For Ms. Thompson, most days look the same: she wakes up, takes several medications, drinks a meal replacement shake and goes to the bathroom.
Mustering up enough energy to go to the bathroom is the “biggest part of my day.”
Then she lies back in bed and waits until it’s time to eat. Mrs. Thompson was once a professional chef who loved cooking and eating. She has become “allergic to everything” and the food she can eat is limited. Most days she cooks unseasoned chicken and vegetables.
Then she takes more medication, including a pill to help her sleep. “Then I wake up and do the whole thing again,” she said.
‘My quality of life with this disease is almost non-existent. There is a real absence of life. It’s not a good life.’
Jason French of Canada has supported expanding the law to include people with mental illness. Mr French has attempted suicide twice due to severe depression.
“My goal from the beginning was to get better. Unfortunately, I am resistant to all these treatments and the bottom line is that I cannot continue to suffer,” he said The New York Times.
“I can’t keep living my life like this.”
‘I don’t want to have to die terrified and alone and for someone to find me somewhere. I want to do it with a doctor.’
“I want to die peacefully in a few minutes.”