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Normalization via legalization

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Definitely unethical, and even illegal under our current law, but you can see how legalization normalizes killing and makes people bold. Going to the hospital and having someone recommend killing is a terrible thing that no one should have to endure. This is an obvious case of discrimination against people with disabilities, but really, it could happen to any one of us.

Sheila Elson, who lives in Newfoundland, was very upset when Dr Aaron Heroux offered assisted suicide for her daughter Candice (25) who lives with multiple disabilities.

According to Geoff Bartlett reporting for CBC News Newfoundland:

“His words were ‘assisted suicide death was legal in Canada,'” she told CBC. “I was shocked, and said, ‘Well, I’m not really interested,’ and he told me I was being selfish.”

Candice Lewis, has several disabilities including spina bifida, cerebral palsy and chronic seizure disorder.

Candice Lewis and her mother. Photo Credit: Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

 

Ottawa showing of the Euthanasia Deception

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I got a chance to see this documentary in the dead of winter. Much nicer to head out on a June evening. It’s well done and presents some good information about how euthanasia works in practice, not theory, both here and abroad. Important viewing. This screening is offered by the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and the director will be there.

Tuesday, June 6, 2017

7 pm

131 Queen St., room 7-52

For more information, click here.

All are welcome, free of charge.

CPSO Legal Challenge Opportunity to Give

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Another opportunity to give. I’m just going to cut and paste the Physicians for Life letter in full. I simply cannot begin to think of living in a province that tells physicians they must go against good treatment principles, their conscience and ethical behaviour and provide things like assisted suicide and euthanasia. So let’s not think about that, and remember that even if this is a David and Goliath struggle (and it is), tis David who won! 

 

Dear Supporters,
 
Three organizations and five brave physicians have launched legal proceedings against the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario in response to its conscience rights-violating policies.
 
The three organizations are Canadian Physicians for Life, the Christian Medical and Dental Society (CMDS), and the Canadian Federation of Catholic Physicians’ Societies (CFCPS).
 
CMDS is a Christian association of physicians, dentists, and students who seek to honour God by integrating faith with professional practice. The CFCPS seeks to promote the teaching of the Catholic Church as applied in the provision of health care and to contribute to the development of public policy. Canadian Physicians for Life is a secular organization, gathering physicians from all backgrounds and specialties, to build a culture of life in Canada by equipping pro-life medical students, supporting physicians in their life-affirming practices, and educating Canadians about these issues.
 
While our purposes are different, we share common concerns about the protection of human life. It is because of this shared concern that we are collaborating to address an urgent issue.
 
We found out yesterday that we need to raise $120,000 by June to cover the costs of the legal proceedings against the CPSO.

We are stronger together in this fight. We’re working together in asking our memberships to pool funds for pro-conscience rights initiatives like this one.

The CPSO has been very aggressively defending this case; I saw that firsthand when I was cross-examined on behalf of Canadian Physicians for Life in March. This is a David and Goliath situation. In addition to fighting the CPSO, we are also fighting the Attorney General of Ontario, who has come alongside the CPSO to defend its policies. The CPSO and the Attorney General of Ontario have far greater resources than we do to fight this battle, but it is our doctors and med students who simply cannot afford to lose this case.

The organizations involved in the case will be fundraising over the next week. We appeal to you, our members, to play a vital role in this collaboration. 

Please make a gift to CPL today to support our collaborative work during this urgent time.

Faye Sonier

Executive Director & General Legal Counsel

Support CPL or any of the organizations fighting this challenge. All are good, worthy organizations.

How assisted suicide will change Canada

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Faye Sonier

Faye Sonier

See my piece over at The Cardus Daily. What can we expect now that we’ve decriminalized euthanasia and assisted suicide? In short, there’s a serious risk of cuts to palliative care funding, we’ll see an increase in the rates of suicide (assisted and unassisted), and euthanasia will be performed without “explicit patient consent.”

If our healthcare systems have an inexpensive and quick intervention option compared to a more expensive and time-consuming option like palliative care, an already overburdened healthcare system will likely gravitate towards the former. In Switzerland, after Geneva’s University Hospital decided to permit assisted suicide in extreme circumstances, the hospital’s community-based palliative care service was discontinued, and the number of palliative care physicians the hospital employed was also cut.

Read more here.

Suicide begets more suicide

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Hey Andrea,

Yeah, it’s not just you. An article published in the Southern Medical Journal found that rates of all suicides increased in jurisdictions were assisted suicide and euthanasia were legalized. I wrote about it here:

Under Bill C-14, people in Attawapiskat who meet the criteria provided in Bill C-14 will be able to request suicide assistance and end their lives. The argument may be made that few of those suicidal in Attawapiskat would qualify for assisted suicide or euthanasia under Bill C-14. However, as the study in the October edition of the Southern Medical Journal demonstrates, general suicide rates increase, not decrease, after legalization. Overall, there has been an average of a 6.3 per cent increase in suicides (assisted and unassisted) among the states where assisted suicide was legalized.

(You mean you don’t memorize everything I publish? Unbreak my heart, Andrea. Unbreak my heart.)

Maybe we should let the Globe and Mail know. Sigh.

Holding Hands

Is it just me?

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Or is the front page of the Globe and Mail yesterday ironic? On the one hand, we are ruling out prosecutions for assisted suicide. On the other hand, we have students protesting the multiple suicides in their area. Suicide contagion is well documented. I can’t help but think there will be an effect in society to assisted suicide even when done under the newly legal conditions.IMG_1033-4-e1465503420720

Outstanding presentations to Federal Joint Committee

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Two outstanding presentations were made to the Joint Committee on Assisted Suicide.

Leading ethicist and director of McGill’s Centre for Medicine, Law and Ethics, Margaret Sommerville told the Federal Joint Committee that “…future generations will look back on the legalization of assisted suicide and euthanasia as the most important social-ethical-legal values decision of the 21st century, and the decisions that Parliament will make about the legislation and regulations to govern those interventions are an integral part of that decision.”

According to this Ottawa Citizen article, she said the harms and risks can be limited if government adopts certain recommendations.  These would be to avoid the future “normalization” of physician-assisted dying, by making it clear that it is an exception, should only be used as a last resort, and used rarely. “If Canada had the same percentage of total deaths of deaths by (physician-assisted dying) as the Netherlands and Belgium currently have (about 4 per cent and 4.6 per cent, respectively) we would have between 11,000 and 12,000 deaths each year.”

Also appearing before the Joint Committee, made up of 6 Senators and 11 Members of Parliament was Ottawa’s Cardinal Collins.

“The strong message from the Supreme Court is unmistakable: some lives are just not worth living. We passionately disagree,” said Collins, who presented on behalf of the Coalition for HealthCare and Conscience.

LifeSite News quoted that Cardinal as saying that

“The right to be put to death will, in practice, become in some cases the duty to be put to death, as subtle pressure is brought to bear on the vulnerable.”(…) “Often, a plea for suicide is a cry for help. Society should respond with care and compassionate support for these vulnerable people, not with death.” Collins emphasized that, “those called to the noble vocation of healing will instead be engaged in killing.” This will have a “grievous effect both on the integrity of a medical profession committed to do no harm, and upon the trust of patients from whom they seek healing.

Catholic hospitals, for example, are “not ‘things.’ They’re communities of people,” Collins said. “They have values and that’s why people come to them,” and they are “funded by the government because they do immense good work.” “If you undermine the institution for what it is, our society would be very, very much harmed,” he cautioned. “Our whole community would be a lot harsher, colder, crueler, without the witness given by community who are on the ground, on the street, day by day, caring for the most needy.”

LifeCanada presented a brief to two members of the Joint Committee at a special hearing in Langley, BC.  The brief can be found here.

The Joint Committee is wrapping up it’s hearing February 4th. To learn more, you can go to the Joint Committee webpage here.

Assisted suicide: Anesthesiologists sound alarm

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In a medical journal article published this month, Canadian anesthesiologists raise concerns about physician assisted suicide:

Euthanasia usually involves a three-step process: a drug to relax the patient, a general anesthetic such as propofol to induce an artificial coma, and, finally, a neuromuscular block that causes respiratory arrest, cardiac arrest and death.

During surgery, “We take a lot of care with our monitoring and our assessment of the patient to judge depths of anesthesia,” Mack said. But if an error is made during euthanasia — and the muscle relaxant injected before the person is in a coma deep enough to prevent feeling the effects — he or she could die by suffocation while paralyzed, but conscious.

heartbeat

It seems like the lawyers at the Supreme Court of Canada were making decisions best left to …well …actual doctors:

In an interview, Mack said doctors are feeling pressured. “A timeline set by the Supreme Court for legislation is one thing, but for us to actually get to the point we can safely provide it is another…”

Shocking. Well, not really.

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