Euthanasia lobby is using Covid-19 crisis to pressure Canadian governments to force Catholic hospitals to do euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

A lobby document by the Canadian Association of MAiD Assessors and Providers (CAMAP) uses the Covid-19 crisis to force faith based healthcare institutions to provide euthanasia.

According to CAMAP, hospitals are refusing to transfer patients during the Covid-19 crisis. Concerning MAiD at faith based health care facilities, the document states:

• Many faith-based facilities prohibit the provision of MAiD.
• The transfer of patients from some or all long-term care (LTC) facilities to acute care hospitals has been prohibited in some jurisdictions due to the risk of spreading COVID-19 infection. CAMAP recognizes that this is an established means of preventing the spread of disease. 
• A significant number of LTC facilities and many acute care hospitals are faith based and prohibit MAiD. Patients resident in these facilities have previously been transferred to other institutions that do not prohibit MAiD. When the institutions to which these faith-based facilities previously transferred patients prohibit transfer for reasons of public health these faith-based institutions should now allow MAiD provisions on-site. CAMAP believes that if necessary provincial governments should issue directives to all faith-based institutions requiring them to allow MAiD when the transfer of patients has been prohibited for reasons of public health.

CAMAP claims to only be pressuring governments to force faith based institutions to kill their patients during the Covid-19 crisis, but clearly, once the killing begins it will continue.

This is not the first time that the euthanasia lobby has pressured Canadian governments to force faith based healthcare institutions to provide euthanasia.

Last year, the euthanasia lobby pressured the Nova Scotia government to order St Martha's Hospital, which is the only hospital in Antigonish NS to provide euthanasia. The Nova Scotia government succumbed to the pressure and ordered St Martha's hospital, to provide euthanasia. In response, the Antigonish Health and Wellness Centre, which is not owned by St Martha's hospital, agreed to do euthanasia (death by lethal injection).

I stated that the euthanasia lobby failed to accomplish their goal, but they will continue to pressure faith based healthcare institutions to provide euthanasia on their premises. Faith based medical institutions must continue to say no.

The CAMAP lobby document also pressures Provincial governments to approve euthanasia assessments and approvals by telehealth/telemedicine. The document states:

All provinces should follow the example of British Columbia and some other 1 provinces and alter the requirements for the assessment of MAiD so that:

• both assessments may be provided using telemedicine;  

• if there is a provincial requirement to have a professional witness during a telemedicine assessment, this should be removed;

The American assisted suicide lobby claims that the recent changes to telehealth provisions in the US permit assisted suicide assessments and approvals by telehealth.

Approving euthanasia or assisted suicide by telehealth/telemedicine means that a person with difficult health issues who feels like a burden on others, or is experiencing depression or existential distress, could be assessed, approved and prescribed a lethal drug cocktail for assisted suicide by telehealth without being examined by a physician.

*Sign the petition: Healthcare regulations must not permit assisted suicide approvals by telehealth (Link).