Canada has been delaying its decision on whether to allow the mentally ill to kill themselves under the Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) protocols since 2023, when mental illness as a sole underlying condition was originally set to become eligible, but was delayed by one year. Then, in 2024, parliament passed a second extension of the mental illness as the sole underlying condition until March 2027.
That date is under challenge from advocacy groups and individuals who apparently can't wait to start killing the mentally ill and are challenging the delay.
However, the delay has allowed opponents to get better organized, and they are marshaling a considerable number of activist groups of their own to maintain protections for the mentally ill.
Their primary argument is that killing the mentally ill wouldn't be necessary if adequate services were available.
Dr. Peter Blusanovics, a Montreal psychiatrist, said, “Basic needs are currently not being met in our healthcare system. Without [legislation halting the expansion] we are condoning a bypass towards suicide, and blatantly admitting defeat.”
Another compelling argument is that the idea of "informed consent" loses all meaning by allowing the mentally ill to kill themselves.
Dr. Paul Saba, a family physician from Lachine, Quebec, told reporters, “From a legal standpoint, those with mental disorders requesting euthanasia… do not meet the condition of free and informed consent, because the desire to die in most cases is a symptom of mental illness.”
Quebec and Alberta provinces have already passed laws saying that, regardless of what the federal government does with the mentally ill and MAiD, they will block any use of MAiD on the mentally ill.
The "slippery slope" that anti-MAiD activists predicted in 2015 when the Canadian high court ruled that the absolute prohibition on assisted dying violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is coming true with a vengeance. In June, 2016, MAiD became legal for adults with a "grievous and irremediable" condition whose natural death was reasonably foreseeable. Subsequent court rulings struck down the "reasonably foreseeable" requirement as unconstitutional.
In 2021, MAiD formally expanded eligibility to those whose natural death is not reasonably foreseeable, such as those with chronic disabilities.
The "slippery slope" had become a cliff edge for those arguing that the expansion of MAiD to the mentally ill would fundamentally alter the relationship between the state and its most vulnerable citizens.
The government of Prime Minister Mark Carney is under enormous pressure from suicide advocates and anti-MAiD activists alike.
Pressure is coming from religious leaders as well, including the Catholic Church. Archbishop Frank Cardinal Leo of Toronto has written a strong letter to Mark Carney, urging him to halt the expansion and instead increase investment in palliative care, mental health services and support for the isolated. Prime Minister Mark Carney has said he won’t take a position on the matter yet. “I like to take informed positions and I’ll wait for the report,” he told journalists.
So far, warning voices have predominated. Jocelyn Downie, a leading MAID activist, has accused the parliamentary committee of bias. The law professor claims the committee has “gone off the rails” and is at risk of making their assessment “based on an incomplete set of evidence.” Downie was invited to testify before the committee in early April, where she made the puzzling argument that the mentally ill must be granted access to euthanasia or they will be at risk of committing suicide. This argument was used in the 2015 Supreme Court decision (in which Downie was also involved) that overturned Canada’s ban on euthanasia, declaring it violated the Charter right to “life, liberty and security of the person.”
Tristin Hopper explains in the National Post, “it was partially because the Supreme Court accepted the argument that ‘the prohibition on physician-assisted dying had the effect of forcing some individuals to take their own lives prematurely.’”
"This sounds like circular reasoning, until you realize that buried in the logic is a presumed distinction between seeking euthanasia and seeking to take your own life," writes The Spectator's Jane Stannus. Thirteen psychiatrists wrote to parliament, "There is no accepted distinction between suicidal ideation and requests for medical assistance in dying." It's a false assumption upon which MAiD might be expanded. The psychiatrists claim there is no clear way to distinguish a request for MAiD from suicidal ideation caused by treatable conditions like depression or substance abuse.
When a depressed teen wants to change genders, thinking it will solve their problems, the same logic that would kill them if that's what they wanted is at work. It calls into question just who is it that's mentally ill?
