Physician-assisted death may serve as a substitute for effective support for people with mental health problems
By Jennifer A. Chandler and Simon Hatcher University of Ottawa The federal government committee looking at physician assisted dying released its long-awaited recommendations recently to much debate. The permissive approach it recommends reflects the spirit of the Supreme Court of Canada declaration that the prohibition of physician assisted dying violates the fundamental human right to…
The Supreme Court's Carter decision set the floor, not the ceiling, according to one proponent
Euthanasia? Assisted suicide? There’s an app for that. Or there soon might be, the executive director of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association told a joint Senate-Commons committee this week. The committee is studying legislative responses to replace the Criminal Code prohibition on helping someone end his or her life. That provision was struck down, of…
Canadians need quality, accessible palliative care, not a quick end to life
Physician-assisted suicide is coming soon to a health-care institution near you, and you won't need to be terminally ill to access this medical intervention. In its decision in the Carter vs. Canada case, the Supreme Court has given Canadians the right to die, and an answer for the perennial problem of pain and suffering. But the Carter…
Quebec doesn't feel legally bound by Canada's separation of powers regarding criminal law
An early surprise of 2016 has to be the failure of Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s ghost to streak across the sky ululating at the damage done last week to his beloved Canadian constitution. Even minus the inspiration of Trudeau père in spiritus, however, Canadians who care at all about our constitutional democracy, and about the rule…
Trudeau government attempts to squirm out of implementing Supreme Court ruling on assisted dying for a suffering few
In an odd twist of Canadian history and fate, a British Columbia lawyer is defending the Supreme Court of Canada against the federal government. Almost a year ago, on Feb. 6, 2015, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that some Criminal Code sections were unconstitutional: it said that a very small group of people are entitled under…
Why a suicide prevention strategy needs to include personal injury prevention
Canadian rates of suicide and attempted suicide have remained largely unchanged over the last several decades. But we have seen increasing rates of suicide in the Canadian military recently, after stable rates for decades. Over 40,000 Canadian soldiers were deployed in Afghanistan, so there has been an understandable concern about mental health problems and suicides among…
For anyone wondering why physician-hastened death makes disabled people feel vulnerable, wonder no more
I like Stephen Fletcher. Our brief encounters, typically in airports or the occasional public event, are always friendly and cordial. It is hard not to admire him. Despite suffering from quadriplegia, he has found the strength to serve his country as a Member of Parliament, at various times holding appointments as Minister of State (Democratic…
It is false to equate suffering arising from disease, illness or disability with a loss of dignity
It is eloquent, persuasive and based in law; it almost had me convinced that physician-assisted dying is the correct response to suffering. In the Carter decision, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that a competent adult who consents to death, and has a “grievous and irremediable medical condition (including illness, disease or disability) that causes…
Supreme Court’s assisted-suicide decision a perversion of human rights
Over the past week or so, the implications of the Supreme Court decision in the assisted suicide case have gradually been clarified. A commonsensical reading of the decision and some reflection on how the Supremes obfuscate the English language suggests an ethical and logical incoherence seldom achieved even by the ermine-clad lawyers who have made…
Most of us do not have the means of providing palliative care for our loved ones
Choice now trumps life as Canada's political preference of, well, choice. For the first 149 years of our country’s existence, life had dignity and deserved the fullest protection of the law. But by this time next year, Parliament must codify the principle that the choice to take one's life is a greater good than life…
By Jennifer A. Chandler and Simon Hatcher University of Ottawa The federal government committee looking at physician assisted dying released its long-awaited recommendations recently to much debate. The permissive approach it recommends reflects the spirit of the Supreme Court of Canada declaration that the prohibition of physician assisted dying violates the fundamental human right to…
