Honoring Juneteenth: Reflections on Love, Justice and Forgiveness

Meghan Schrader

By Meghan Schrader

Meghan is an instructor at E4 - University of Texas (Austin) and an EPC-USA board member.

Before I delve into the main part of this post, I want to refer readers to the Juneteenth blog post I wrote last year, which contains information about the history and further empowerment of BIPOC disabled persons, such as articles and tweets written by BIPOC persons with disabilities, discussion of admonishments that BIPOC disabled persons have given to white people in the disabled community, books and articles written by historians, etc. But on this Juneteenth I am going to tell a personal story; I hope it will inspire readers to listen to the experiences of BIPOC persons, especially those with disabilities, and integrate their concerns into our culture, while also inspiring readers of all races to reflect on the intersection of justice, love and forgiveness in this collaborative process.

My biological mother, Meg, had a very painful childhood. In addition to beating his children, her father was a leader in the Ku Klux Klan. So, until she was about seven, poor Meg learned that oppressing black African Americans was good, and that black people were evil.

On her first day of second grade, my biological mother walked into her classroom to find that the teacher was a large black woman. Given the racist lies her father had taught her, my biological mother panicked. “She’s gonna kill me!” Meg screamed before running out of the room.

The school called Meg’s mother, and she and some of the other staff got Meg to go back into the classroom. When Meg re-entered the classroom, the teacher gave her a big hug. “It’s going to be okay,” the teacher said gently.

This was one of the only hugs that my bio mother had ever had in her life, and the experience of being hugged was surprising for her. Meg told me that her fear went away because she felt cared for and safe, and the teacher continued to nurture her throughout the school year, acting as one of the best teachers Meg had ever had.

I do not know if the teacher knew that Meg ran out of the room because she was a black woman, but I assume she did, and I want to make sure I acknowledge that this interaction was horribly unfair to the teacher. BIPOC people with and without disabilities have spoken out about how exhausting and traumatic it is to try to instruct or interact with people who have prejudiced or uninformed beliefs, and how unjust it is that this process essentially involves giving expert advice for free.

But, I am so grateful to this teacher for having mercy on the seven-year-old child that Meg was, and giving Meg one of the first hugs she had ever experienced in her life. I can only hope that in my own work with other people who have developmental disabilities, I can emulate the compassion and generosity of that teacher; who lovingly mentored my abused bio-mother, a seven-year-old who had no way of understanding that racism was wrong. I think the intervention of that teacher is one of the reasons that Meg did not grow up to be a racist person.

Not all interactions related to redressing systemic racism and ableism are going to be touching like the one I just described. But I hope that the story, and the resources referenced in my previous Juneteenth post, can help inspire members of the anti assisted suicide movement to thoughtfully engage issues related to systemic oppression, and extend grace to one another as we work on what Stephen Mendelsohn’s faith called “tikkum olam,” or “repairing the world.”

Petition calls on the US Food and Drug Administration to investigate assisted suicide drug cocktails

To the FDA's Compounding Incidents Program, (Link to sign the online petition).

The petitioners draw your attention to the following:

Whereas the compounded drug cocktails being used for assisted suicide have had high rates of overdose, failure of expected pharmacological action, and adverse experiences associated with their use for assisted suicide; and;

Whereas the experiments that continue to be done to develop the compounded drug cocktails used for assisted suicide violate the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ regulations for the protection of human subjects under 45 CFR part 46;

Therefore, we call on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to investigate the adverse drug experiences with the compounded drug cocktails used for assisted suicide.

(Link to sign the online petition).

Information:

Despite claims that assisted suicide is a painless death, complications with assisted suicide remain common, and in fact have increased over the last decade. The FDA’s Compounding Incidents Program aims to protect the public against poor quality compounded drugs, yet no research has been done on whether the assisted suicide cocktails currently in use meet current standards.

An article by Manuela Callari published by Medscape on March 13, 2025, asked the question, “Do We Know Enough About Assisted Dying Drugs?” (1) Claud Regnard, MD, a retired palliative medicine consultant in the UK told Medscape:

“The amount of evidence supporting the use of these drugs is astoundingly small. The last study looking at efficacy and side effects was published 25 years ago, using data from 10 years earlier. 

“You wouldn’t allow this in any way with any other sort of drugs,” Regnard said. In a 2022 study, he found that drugs used for assisted dying have not undergone the usual level of scrutiny.(2)

The pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of these drugs at high doses remain poorly understood. “We extrapolate from therapeutic doses, but we have no proper data on what happens at lethal doses,” Regnard said. “That’s not science—that’s guesswork.”

Based on the Oregon data we know that there are serious problems with the use of compounded drugs for assisted suicide. 

The 2023 Oregon Death with Dignity Act report indicated that the longest time for an assisted suicide death was 137 hours (five days plus 17 hours) and the assisted suicide complications rate was almost 10%. In Oregon, complications are only reported when a health care provider is present at the death. In 2023, there were ten known complications based on 102 reports from health care providers. (3)

Regarding the assisted suicide drug trials, JoNel Aleccia reported the following for The Seattle Times on March 5, 2017:

[Dr. Carol] Parrot and [Dr. Robert] Wood are part of a seven-member group of doctors in the Northwest who came up with the three-drug protocol after Valeant Pharmaceuticals Inc. acquired the rights to secobarbital, known as Seconal, in 2015 and raised the price sharply. 

“We wanted the new drug regime to be safe, reliable and effective—and cost $500 or less,” said Parrot.

Earlier in the article, Aleccia states,

The first Seconal alternative turned out to be too harsh, burning patients’ mouths and throats, causing some to scream in pain. The second drug mix, used 67 times, has led to deaths that stretched out hours in some patients—and up to 31 hours in one case. (4)

Lisa Krieger’s article, published in Medical Xpress on September 8, 2020, also reported on the lethal drug cocktail trials:

A little-known secret, not publicized by advocates of aid-in-dying, was that while most deaths were speedy, others were very slow. Some patients lingered for six or nine hours; a few, more than three days. No one knew why, or what needed to change. 

“The public thinks that you take a pill and you’re done,” said Dr. Gary Pasternak, chief medical officer of Mission Hospice in San Mateo. “But it’s more complicated than that.” (5)

Doctors who participate in assisted suicide developed lethal compounded drug cocktails with human trials. The developers were concerned with the lethal efficacy and cost of the drug cocktail as opposed to the negative consequences associated with its use. The assisted suicide drug cocktail trials appear to have violated the Nuremburg Code.

We, the petitioners, call on the FDA to perform an investigation into the use of compounded drug cocktails used for assisted suicide based on the high rates of adverse experiences and into the experiments done to develop the assisted suicide drug cocktails that appear to have violated 45 CFR part 46.

References:

1. Manuela Callari, “Do We Know Enough About Assisted Dying Drugs?” Medscape, March 13, 2025 https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/do-we-know-enough-about-assisted-dying-drugs-2025a100064q?form=fpf, accessed June 16, 2025.
2. Worthington, A., Finlay, I., and Regnard C. (March 10, 2022). Efficacy and safety of drugs used for ‘assisted dying’ British Medical Bulletin. 142:15-22. https://doi.org/10.1093/bmb/idac009
3. Oregon Death with Dignity Act 2023 report https://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/PROVIDERPARTNERRESOURCES/EVALUATIONRESEARCH/DEATHWITHDIGNITYACT/Documents/year26.pdf, accessed June 16, 2025.
4. JoNel Aleccia, “Northwest doctors rethink aid-in-dying drugs to avoid prolonged deaths,” The Seattle Times, October 5, 2017, https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/northwest-doctors-rethink-aid-in-dying-drugs-to-avoid-prolonged-deaths/, accessed June 16, 2025.
5. Lisa Kreiger, “Doctors seek life-ending drugs that smooth the way for the terminally ill,” The Medical Express, September 8, 2020, https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-09-doctors-life-ending-drugs-smooth-terminally.html, accessed June 16, 2025.

A Canadian hospital is slowly starving and abusing a disabled man to death

Meghan Schrader

By Meghan Schrader

Meghan is an instructor at E4 - University of Texas (Austin) and an EPC-USA board member. 

Sign the petition: Roger Foley needs to be fed (Link).

A hospital in Canada is slowly starving and abusing a disabled man to death. 

Seriously, can someone airlift Roger Foley out of there?

Hospital staff have, of course, offered Roger Foley “MAiD.” It’s not that “MAiD” made the hospital staff abuse Foley, doctors and nursing staff bully disabled people all the time in jurisdictions where “MAiD” is not legal. However, now healthcare staff have a new, lethal implement of structural oppression at their disposal: they have the power to bully Foley into being offed by a state-sanctioned serial killer. This is an example of the disgusting consequences of a movement run by privileged individuals who are willing to subject disabled people to a new implement of degradation and violence; all so they can plan their deaths like they planned where to go to a first tier college. For instance, in “A Designed Death: Where and When the World Allows it, Avovah Wittenberg Cox asserts:

“For Boomers used to planning and controlling many of life’s choices, from when to have children to what kind of milk in their coffee, defining a good death seems like something they may want to discuss with their families – and decide for themselves.”

Roger Foley

An agenda of allowing any and every Boomer to control their deaths implies expanding “MAiD” beyond the terminally ill, and I think this quote aptly illustrates the privilege of most MAiD supporters. If you are a wounded soul whose terminally ill loved one shot themselves in the head and then left a suicide note saying they wished they could have used “MAiD,” then I empathize deeply with you. Of course people who have endured that type of trauma would think “MAiD” is a good idea. However, if you are not a horribly suffering person who is simply willing to sacrifice marginalized people so that you can design a boutique death, then I do not sympathize with you. You want to control your death like you planned when to have your children? I want a house next to the ocean in Fiji.

Maybe some of the proponents who are not suffering horribly and are just willing to sacrifice disabled people so that they can plan their deaths like they planned where to have their weddings should consent to being locked up in a hospital, deprived of food, water and toileting and subjected to bright lighting that hurts their bodies; while bullies stand over their beds urging them to die by assisted suicide. It might help them put some of their current fears about suffering and their demands for autonomy into perspective.

Previous articles by Meghan Schrader (Articles Link). 

Previous articles about Roger Foley (Articles Link).

They Built a Death Chamber in a Catholic Hospital. You Paid for It

This article was published by Kelsi Sheren on her substack on June 17, 2025..

This Is Not Medicine. It’s Modern Extermination. Inside the St. Paul’s Death Chamber in a Catholic Hospital.

Kelsi Sheren

By Kelsi Sheren

Hey! Look over here!

Your taxes are building eugenics facilities!

St. Paul's hospital in BC has just installed a new killing centre. Now servicing BC patients' the government has decided are to expensive to actually care for. A Recent decision by the British Columbia government to forcibly establish MAiD killing centres adjacent to the Catholic operated St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver represents where Canada is at when it comes to helping its citizens. This is a unprecedented shift in Canada’s healthcare practices, raising profound ethical, religious, and societal concerns.

These new locations popping up across the country are designed for effective and fast killing. A one stop shop for death.

You come in and you never come out. This is Canadian health care…. so they say.

St. Paul's Hospital

In June 2023, pro death cult advocates significantly escalated their pressure campaign, utilizing the tragic case of Samantha O'Neill as leverage. If you haven’t heard of this case, let me give you the Coles notes. Samantha O’Neill had requested to be killed at St. Paul's Hospital, but in alignment with its longstanding Catholic ethical stance against euthanasia, the hospital transferred her compassionately to St. John's Hospice.

Instead of recognizing this action as a respectful accommodation of religious ethics and patient choice, the pro death cults of Canada leveraged intense media scrutiny to insist that Catholic hospitals should directly provide euthanasia, I.E. DEATH. They framed transfers as inhumane and insensitive. Just a quick side bar, I think killing someone is more inhumane and insensitive then moving some one, but I digress.

Shoreline Space

Naturally the weak BC government gave into the pressure and public controversy. By December 1, 2023, it expropriated land from Providence Health, the Catholic entity overseeing St. Paul's, and proceeded rapidly to construct a dedicated killing facility, now known as the "Shoreline Space." This facility, described as utilitarian and starkly institutional, sits discreetly (INTENTIONALLY) within an interior courtyard of the existing St. Paul's Hospital.

Hidden behind security fencing and gates, and shielded from public awareness. As do all bad things happen, hidden away from prying eyes and in the dark.

This structure symbolizes a horrific new reality: killing administered covertly yet deliberately close to faith-based medical institutions dedicated to preserving life.

Even more alarming is the government’s intention to replicate this controversial approach. Detailed investigative reporting by independent journalist Terry O'Neill uncovered evidence that planning for yet another killing facility is already well underway at the new St. Paul's Hospital, currently under construction at False Creek Flats. This new facility, expected to open by 2027, just in time for the new expansion of MAID in the mentally ill. This side example of health care will further embed killing in a setting historically committed to life-affirming care.

Internal emails and documents obtained through freedom-of-information requests reveal extensive logistical planning to ensure seamless integration of killing services, including specific requirements regarding proximity to the pharmacy, emergency services access, and even parking logistics.

The graphic and chilling reality extends beyond St. Paul's Hospital. O'Neill’s reporting has shown that Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) already operates MAiD facilities within buildings housing Catholic-run hospices, May’s Place and St. John Hospice, despite Providence Health’s explicit, longstanding prohibition against killing. Providence Health, constrained by contracts and lease agreements, remains powerless to prevent these facilities from operating so intimately close to their hospice patients, creating a profound ethical conflict and confusion for staff, patients, and families alike.

Grafeneck castle

Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, highlights the chilling historical parallels to Germany's notorious Aktion T4 euthanasia program. Specifically, he references Grafeneck Castle, initially a compassionate Lutheran care facility forcibly expropriated by the Nazi regime to become the first euthanasia killing center. The similarities in governmental overreach, forcible land expropriation, and ethical disregard raise uncomfortable and necessary historical comparisons.

Vancouver physician Dr. Will Johnston further underscores the severity of these actions, characterizing the imposition of euthanasia-killing facilities into traditionally life-affirming spaces as an expression of governmental totalitarianism. Johnston argues that such policies demonstrate not inclusion or respect for diversity, but a dangerous intolerance toward those with conscientious objections, effectively marginalizing religious and ethical convictions from healthcare delivery.

The pro-death cult are jumping up and down, bragging at their events that they finally broke the only religious safe guard we had left. (This is true I have an audio recording I made while at one)

Louis Brier nursing home.

This is not the first either. “Dr” Ellen Wiebe has broken these rules before. She attempted to defend herself against allegations of "sneaking in and killing someone" at an orthodox Jewish nursing home. “

“The Louis Brier Nursing Home in Vancouver has issued a formal complaint with the B.C. College of Physicians and Surgeons against Dr. Ellen Wiebe after she granted 83-year-old Barry Hyman's request to die at the facility he calls home."

Long story short, she went in and MAIDED a man in a Jewish nursing home.

“Dr’s” like her don’t see why this is completely unacceptable.

As Canadians, we need to stop hiding behind what’s happening here and with this disturbing trajectory, we need to stand up. Why aren’t we urgently questioning our politicians and asking why all our tax dollars are going to perfecting and facilitating killing centres but not hospitals.

Why are we adding more locations to increase death and not health care?

Why are we not asking our community how they feel about people being brought into a hiding building, never to come out again?

Why are we standing by as Canada becomes the eugenics capital of the world.

Why are we allowing these pro death cult bullies to come after our only remaining religious strongholds??

Ill tell you why we aren’t, because the dark is scary.

It’s terrifying if I’m being honest, because these people and this government have made it clear that they don’t actually want to help people, they want to remove the “burdens” from our society. They want to cut out the vulnerable and those who can no longer protect themselves, those whose families have given up on them due to overbearing medical costs or care giver burnout.

Canada showed its hand when it began prioritizing death over life by building facilities specifically for killing and cutting funding for those needed for healing.

And now we will begin eradicating anyone who even looks a little ill, because if you are not lonely enough, desperate enough, poor enough, sick enough or mentally unwell yet.

Give it time, the way this country is going.

It’s only a matter of time.

LINKS:

https://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2025/06/euthanasia-maid-unit-forced-onto-st.html

https://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2025/05/vancouver-death-clinic-imposed-on.html

https://bccatholic.ca/news/catholic-van/government-taking-property-from-st-paul-s-hospital-to-deliver-maid

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-monday-edition-1.4477708/doctor-accused-of-sneaking-in-and-killing-someone-at-jewish-nursing-home-says-she-did-nothing-wrong-1.4477714

Québec Medical Group requires physicians and nurse practitioners to refer for euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg

Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

A memorandum from a Québec medical group reminds healthcare professionals of the obligation to leave their conscience "at the door" and refer patients for death by euthanasia (MAiD). The subject line reads "General reminder regarding requests for medical assistance in dying (MAiD)."

 

Canada legalized MAiD in June 2016 by creating an exception in the Criminal Code for homicide (murder).

An association of healthcare professionals in Montreal Québec sent a memorandum as a "general reminder" regarding requests for medical assistance in dying (MAID) to ensure that all healthcare professionals know that they are obligated to refer all patients who request death by euthanasia (MAiD). If the healthcare professional conscientiously objects the request must be sent to the Interdisciplinary Support Group (ISG). The memorandum states:

No healthcare professional can ignore a request for MAID. It is the responsibility of every professional to ensure that such a request is taken care of. As stipulated in sections 26 & 31 of the s-32.0001 - Act respecting end-of life care, any health or social services professional may complete the (contemporary) MAID request form when a person so requests.

Any physician or specialized nurse practitioner who receives a request for an MAID must notify the Interdisciplinary Support Group (ISG) and, if applicable, forward the request form to the ISG when he or she:

• refuses a request (based on the eligibility criteria recognized by the Act);
• refuses to assist a person in formulating an anticipated application (moral or religious conscientious objection) or in withdrawing such an application;
• refuses to carry out the required examination.

The ISG is to provide clinical, administrative and ethical support for end-of-life care. In particular, for the evaluation of a request or the administration of MAID, continuous palliative sedation and in the drafting of an anticipated MAID application (answering questions, coaching and mentoring by experts).

You can contact the MAID and ISG coordinator by e-mail: amm.comtl@ssss.gouv.qc.ca or at: 514-809-6174.

For more information, the CIUSSS intranet is regularly updated https://intranet.comtl.rtss.qc.ca/en/clinicalpractice/palliative-care-and-end-of-life-care/medical-assistance-in-dying-maid.

We remind you that no intimidation of anyone requesting information or an MAID, nor of the professionals involved, will be tolerated. Anyone witnessing such a situation should report it: employees should inform their superior, users and families should contact the Ombudsman.

Thank you for your cooperation,

For people outside of Canada, healthcare is a provincial jurisdiction, therefore each province will have different rules pertaining to referrals for euthanasia. 

 

When reading this memorandum, it is sadly not surprising that Québec has the highest euthanasia rate in the world.

 

More articles on this topic:

• Canada's euthanasia deaths continue to rise with approximately 16,500 euthanasia deaths in 2024 (Link).
• Québec shows the way with euthanasia in Canada (Link).
• Québec approves euthanasia by advance request (Link).

The Health Impacts of Seniors' Loneliness.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

In the past, The Canadian Association of Retired Persons (CARP) was a strong promoter of Canada's euthanasia law and expansions of that law, but a new CARP initiative tackling Seniors Loneliness is worthwhile. In a recent update on Seniors' Loneliness CARP states:

Social isolation is a serious issue when it comes to seniors and a signal of a dysfunctional society. It’s estimated that almost 30% of Canadian seniors live alone – and without strong community connections, many of these seniors suffer silently from loneliness and depression.

Loneliness can impact physical and mental well-being. Isolation can lead to depression, which in turn can further exacerbate health issues. For example, depression in older adults is tied to a higher risk of cardiac diseases. At the same time, depression reduces an older person’s ability to recover from illness.

Depression is not a typical part of aging. Yet it is estimated that 20% of older adults experience symptoms – like persistent sadness, loss of interest in activities, fatigue, feelings of worthlessness and even suicidal thoughts – and rates increase up to 40% for those in hospitals and long-term care homes.

These numbers are a warning sign of a public health crisis hiding in plain sight. The World Health Organization recently named loneliness a global health priority, urging countries to take action. And the science is clear: chronic isolation is more harmful than smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

While CARP is promoting their initiative to counter Senior's Loneliness, I want to reiterate my support for the Compassionate Community Care charity that also focuses on reducing Seniors' Loneliness.

While CARP has strongly promoted euthanasia (MAiD) in the past, the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition recognizes how loneliness can lead to requests euthanasia. Many people who are living with difficult health conditions also feel lonely, feel hopeless and begin to believe that they have no further reason to live. 

Instead of offering these people death, they should be offered support from a caring community who reasures them that they are important and that they still have a reason to live.

Contact the Compassionate Community Care charity (CCC) to join the Visitor Training program or become trained to provide advocacy for your family members or people who you know. CCC also provides a calling service for contacting lonely seniors who simply need someone to talk to or someone to listen.

Physicians group urges New York Governor to veto assisted suicide bill.

Dear Governor Hochul,

My name is Dr Sharon Quick and I am President of Physicians for Compassionate Care Education Foundation (PCCEF), an organization without religious or political affiliation that advocates for the vulnerable at end of life. I have expertise in pediatric anesthesia, critical care, and medical ethics. We oppose A 136. Please veto this poorly constructed bill.

Summary: A 136, like other medically-assisted suicide laws, inevitably violates (rather than upholds) patient autonomy; creates (based on subjective, often inaccurate, criteria) a class of marginalized patients with the disability of terminal illness from whom the standard of medical care can be withheld; allows lethal drugs to unnecessarily substitute for good palliative care and pain control; disproportionately preys on those with mental health problems and disabilities; and destroys the foundation of medical ethics, creating distrust among patients and the health care profession. In addition, A 136 is the most radical policy in the country because it has no waiting period for obtaining lethal drugs. It also has no residency requirement which could turn New York into an international assisted suicide tourism destination for one-stop lethal drug prescriptions. Will New York citizens have to pay for funerals and/or transport of bodies back to their home states and countries? The bill makes no provision for the fact that out-of-state citizens or non-citizens may be pressured to take lethal drugs immediately and they are not required to make funeral and burial arrangements.

1. Pain should never be a reason to seek lethal drugs. Complaints of excessive symptoms indicate doctors lack palliative care knowledge, such as when to refer to pain management specialists. Lethal drugs should never be a solution for lack of education. In addition, those in significant pain lack capacity to consent for lethal drugs. Instead, improve palliative care access and expertise, which has been assessed as likely insufficient to meet the needs of New York.1 There is evidence that minorities, the uninsured, those on Medicaid, and those living in disadvantaged communities may encounter barriers to receiving palliative care.2 It would be a tragedy for these under served populations if this legislation made lethal prescriptions more accessible than palliative care.

2. This bill has no waiting period to obtain lethal drugs; no other law is so rash. Immediate death does not give adequate time for appropriate discussion and interventions for vulnerable patients who make rash decisions out of fear, depression, embarrassment, subtle pressure by a tired caregiver who makes them feel like a burden, or other reversible or transient concerns. Such patients often change their minds and no longer want to hasten death.

3. Physicians may be wrong about a patient’s prognosis, and they often miss depression and compromised decision-making capacity. Patients in WA and OR have died up to 5 years beyond their original “terminal” diagnosis and receipt of lethal drugs. Neither mental health status nor capacity are required to be assessed immediately before a patient ingests lethal drugs, which could be years after initial assessment; there is no guarantee that patients are not compromised at that time.

4. Lethal drugs are not a proportionate means of achieving palliative care goals but devalue vulnerable patients in a way that violates the very goals palliative care aims to achieve. Assisted suicide is abandonment, not health care, and is not part of palliative medicine. Lethal cocktails are bitter-tasting, sometimes mouth-burning liquids, and patients must ice their mouths with popsicles and take anti-emetics just to get them down. Risks include nausea, vomiting, aspiration, seizures, and not dying. Palliative care can do far better.

5. Lethal drug prescriptions undermine autonomy and discriminate against the disability community. Requests for lethal drugs are not primarily for pain but because of depression and/or psychological responses to disabilities developed during terminal illness--which is itself a disability by both social security and ADA criteria. This bill grants new choices and power to doctors, not patients, allowing them to treat patients unequally, subjectively placing them into either (1) a protected group (getting standard mental health care) or (2) a marginalized group with the disability of terminal illness (who can be abandoned to lethal drugs). This discriminates against the disability community and undermines autonomy by violating equality of persons. New York does not need a two-tiered health system that devalues those with the disability of terminal illness.

6. The slippery slope is real. Patients with depression and those with non-terminal diagnoses of anorexia, hernia, arthritis, and “medical complications” have received lethal drugs. Hundreds of doctors’ and patients’ consent forms are missing in Washington and Colorado.

a. In 2023, Oregonian Cody Sontag decided to avoid advanced dementia by killing herself via voluntarily stopping eating and drinking (called VSED). An Oregon doctor declared her “terminally ill” due to dehydration from VSED. He waived the waiting period, prescribed lethal drugs immediately, and Cody died from them.(3) Dehydration is not “incurable” or “irreversible,” as legally required. How many others with non-terminal diagnoses have used VSED to access lethal drugs? No one—least of all physicians whom the vulnerable must be able to trust—should be granted god-like powers to decide which disabilities make life worthless, prey on those who lack capacity, and assist with termination of those so judged.

7. There is no mechanism to enforce the law or detect abuse, which is perhaps why no sanctions have been reported. The design of this bill, like other assisted suicide laws, is a set-up for undetected elder abuse, coercion, or murder, given neither capacity re-evaluation nor the presence a neutral party are required when patients ingest lethal drugs (sometimes weeks, months, or years after initial evaluation).

8. Doctors often devalue those with disabilities. Protect the medical profession from acting on that bias by not granting them power to assist the suicides of patients disabled by terminal illness—especially a bill that has no more oversight than Oregon, where physicians are not disciplined for ending the lives of those with non-terminal illness (like Cody).

9. Protect the medical profession from distrust, both between patients and their doctors and among doctors. Patients in the northwest who are opposed to assisted suicide now have legitimate fears that doctors might overlook depression or compromised capacity, devalue them, and prescribe lethal drugs if they request hastened death while depressed or in a moment of vulnerable weakness. A death request is often a plea for help, and people often change their minds about hastening death with time, treatment, and support. Dr. Bentz lost trust in colleagues after referring a patient to an oncologist who, over Dr. Bentz’ objections, gave lethal drugs to his patient instead of treating his depression.

10. This bill contains potential conscience violations for physicians and health care employers:

a. Requires falsifying the death certificate, naming the underlying disease as the cause, rather than the actual cause of death—lethal drugs (p. 12, lines 12-14)

b. It is unclear whether an objecting health care employer can prohibit physician employees from providing information about lethal drug provision or referring patients for them, or whether objecting physicians could be forced to inform or refer for this process, both of which would violate their conscience for participation in an unethical practice that is not medical care.

11. Finally, participants do not need to be New York residents, which may allow persons out-of-state (or country) to obtain lethal drugs. These patients may not receive adequate evaluation, especially of capacity and lack of coercion, by New York physicians who may not know them well. Non-residents would be pressured to take the lethal drugs immediately in New York to avoid legal complications from ingestion in their home state/country, when many patients hold on to the drugs for weeks, months, and even years, and some never take them. New York may become an international assisted suicide tourism destination.

Please veto A 136. I am happy to answer any questions you may have.

Sincerely,
Sharon Quick, MD, MA (Bioethics)
President, Physicians for Compassionate Care Education Foundation (PCCEF)

P.O. Box 7122 Bonney Lake WA 98491 Tel: 253-501-7011 or info@pccef.org, www.pccef.org

1. CAPC. Palliative Care in New York. 2025. (Link)
2. Chambers B. How to Increase Awareness and Reduce Gaps in Palliative Care for MinoritiesJuly 9, 2020. (Link) (accessed 9-22-2024).
3. Pope TM, Brodoff L. Medical aid in dying to avoid late-stage dementia. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society 2024: 1-7. (Link).

The legalization of assisted suicide is not “inevitable.”

Meghan Schrader

By Meghan Schrader

Meghan is an instructor at E4 - University of Texas (Austin) and an EPC-USA board member.

Unfortunately, New York’s senate has voted to legalize assisted suicide, and the bill now goes to the governor’s desk. In order to ask the governor to veto the legislation, contact her. If you live in New York and can get to the capital building, please consider paying the governor’s office a visit to explain why assisted suicide will exacerbate the world’s pattern of systemic ableism.

With regard to that pattern, it’s not shocking that New York legislators would ignore the disabled community’s opposition to this policy. Despite New York’s protestations of progressivism, the state has not been particularly kind to its disabled community: the governor calling home care services a “racket,” the governor giving a speech in which the only time she mentioned disabled people was to promote increased institutionalization to stop gun violence, Andrew Cuomo allowing Covid 19 to run rampant through nursing home facilities, New York candidate Andrew Yang suggesting institutionalizing people with psychiatric disabilities so they do no harm property values, and the subway system being largely inaccessible to disabled people. In 2021 the director of New York’s ACLU delusionally said that her organization had been advocating for disabled people “for decades,” even though NYCLU’s webpage of disability rights commentary goes back only to 2020; three of the commentaries being about how wonderful “MAiD” is for the disabled community. NYCLU apparently does not care about the input from disability rights groups that really have been advocating for disability rights for decades; the national ACLU did not create a disability rights division until 2012, ninety two years after the organization was founded. So, if you are a disabled New Yorker who gets institutionalized, or your disability can become terminal without the correct support and people around you pressure you to die by assisted suicide don’t worry, the ACLU will be there for you in nine decades.

But if New York’s governor does sign its assisted suicide bill, I don’t see why New York has to doom the rest of the country. I think some opponents are likely feeling demoralized by the fear that assisted suicide being legalized in New York means it will inevitably be legalized throughout the country. If we give up and let the proponents just march in wherever they feel like it, sure, but there’s no reason why we have to do that.

It is sad that the proponents may achieve a victory in New York, but there would still be 38 states that have not legalized assisted suicide. Despite the movement of SB138 in New York, the anti assisted suicide movement still has important tools at its disposal. There is still the United Spinal lawsuit in California, and I think we have a good chance at succeeding if we can get SCOTUS to take the case.

The American Association of Suicidology’s 2023 “retirement” of its 2017 “MAiD is not suicide” statement is a huge win for us. The American Medical Association’s reaffirmation of its opposition to assisted suicide is another significant victory.

So, don’t throw in the towel. The legalization of assisted suicide is not “inevitable.” Re-double the time you spend on the issue. Look for ways in which such policies can be corrected. And this is one of the most important things I can reiterate: make sure members of the anti assisted suicide movement are working together to ensure disabled people everywhere have the support we need to flourish: a strong social support system, excellent mental health services, a good education, accessible employment, etc. These things provide a bulwark against the ableist degradation that leads to suicide, both assisted an unassisted.

Two personal stories regarding MAID

The following true story was sent to our EPC "Story Contest", from a reader who wishes to remain anonymous. We will refer to her only as Barbara.

Please visit our "contributor info" (Link). "recent stories" (Link). and "story index" (Link). 

We would be thrilled to receive your own story at: story@epcc.ca

All written formats are welcome, especially short video's.

Two personal stories regarding MAID (euthanasia)

I am sharing a recent experience my husband had in a hospital in Alberta. It is not to point a finger at the doctor treating him because he respects and admires her. It is instead to put a spotlight on what the official government narrative is regarding MAiD, how it is supposed to be administered, and what is in reality happening to vulnerable individuals who seek treatment at a hospital. (Not all individuals, but enough to raise an alarm.) 

On Wednesday, May 7, 2025, he was admitted to the hospital with a suspected pulmonary embolism. It was diagnosed and he was receiving treatment (blood thinners and morphine). On Saturday, his doctor came into his room (I was not with him at the time) and said to him, “I am embarrassed to ask you this question, but I am required by federal mandate to ask people over the age of 65: Do you want to end this?” (He’s 67) with MGUS, a pre-cancerous condition. He immediately replied that he did not, and she said that she wouldn’t have accepted his answer anyway. He called me surprised and shocked and relayed his experience to me. 

I would have thought that perhaps he was confused because of the morphine, if it were not for an experience a dear friend of mine had three years ago when she was dealing with Stage 4 breast cancer. She fainted while she and her husband were out and he rushed her to the hospital in Calgary. When she awoke, she was in a hospital bed. Confused, she asked the nurse where she was. The nurse explained that she was in the hospital awaiting MAID. She asked what that was and when it was explained to her, she was outraged. She said she would never, ever request such a thing. When she chastised her husband for letting her be in that position, he was chagrined and said that when they brought her in, they asked her if she wanted it and she had agreed.

Both of these experiences suggest that MAID is being raised not in response to the patient’s request, but rather based on age or the medical team’s assessment of quality of life. This is frightening. 

I believe that these two stories are not isolated. I fear many other seniors and vulnerable patients are being approached in similar ways and may not have the ability or presence of mind to respond confidently or resist. It makes me wonder if a hospitalized person needs the 24 hour presence of an advocate to prevent them from being pressured to take MAiD. The narrative seems to have gone from a terminal person asking for MAiD to doctors asking if the person wants MAiD when they are in a vulnerable position. My prediction is that it will soon shift to pressure on people to do the right thing by ending their suffering. (Similar to Trudeau asking retired people to give up their homes for younger people).

I share these testimonies with you in hopes that your organization can bring further attention to this disturbing trend and advocate for:

• Transparency in how MAID is being introduced in hospital settings,
• Clear, age-neutral policies regarding end-of-life conversations,
• Stronger safeguards against miscommunication, pressure, or consent violations
  

I am grateful that there are organizations like yours who advocate for the vulnerable sector among us.

Barbara