New Zealand will debate expanding it's euthanasia law.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The New Zealand government is discussing expansions to their euthanasia law. The primary expansion that is being discussed is the removal of the 6 month terminal illness prognosis in the law to permit euthanasia of people with chronic conditions, similar to what Canada did in March 2021.

New Zealand passed a euthanasia referendum on October 17, 2020 with the euthanasia law coming into force on November 7, 2021. After less than three years of killing, a debate on expanding the law by removing the terminal illness requirement has begun.

Anne Whyte reported for The Press on August 29 that:

The ACT Party is in the process of making moves to widen the scope on euthanasia, launching back into the contentious issue that could have sunk the law when it originally went through Parliament.

The End Of Life Choice law currently has a range of requirements needed to be eligible for assisted dying, including being in an “advanced state of irreversible decline in physical capability” and experiencing “unbearable suffering that cannot be relieved in a manner that the person considers tolerable”.

They also need to have a terminal illness “that is likely to end the person’s life within six months”.

The ACT leader, David Seymour, who sponsored the original euthanasia law called the terminal illness requirement "a political compromise." Whyte reported:

“The six month limit was a political compromise,” ACT leader David Seymour said on Wednesday, at a petition handover in front of Parliament.

Seymour, speaking to CEO of advocacy group Social Justice Aotearoa Jackie Foster who delivered the petition asking Parliament for the euthanasia legislation to also allow those who have degenerative diseases, said he was “sorry that we made that compromise”.

“I never supported it. I never wanted it. I didn't introduce it that way. I had to compromise, because if I didn't get the votes, there'd be no law at all.”

Canada legalized euthanasia in June 2016. In March 2021 Canada passed Bill C-7 that removed the "terminal illness" requirement in the law, created a two-tier law by removing the waiting period for people who were terminally ill and adding a 90-day waiting period for people who were not terminally ill and allowing euthanasia for mental illness alone.

Euthanasia for mental illness alone remains contentious and has currently been delayed until March 2027.

In the United States, nearly every state that has legalized assisted suicide has later expanded their law.

The euthanasia lobby considers legal safeguards as a compromise that can later be removed from the law.

Scotland's Law Society publishes concerns with euthanasia bill.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

I have written several commentaries on euthanasia and assisted suicide bills. I have found that most of the legislation is not properly defined. In fact, I believe the Canada's euthanasia law was intentionally written with vague language that lacked definition to enable it to expand over time.

Elaine Coull, the Convener of the Law Society of Scotland’s Health and Medical Law published a critique on August 22 of Scotland's Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults Bill which is currently being debated in the Scottish parliament. Coull wrote:

“We have serious concerns about the competence of this Bill in relation to the European Convention on Human Rights and mental health and capacity legislation. In particular, the bill would appear at odds with key elements of the Age of Legal Capacity Act 1991.

The United Nations Committee on Disability Rights has stated in more than one report that Canada's euthanasia law contravenes the rights of people with disabilities (Link) (Link). 

Coull then questions the role of medical professionals.

“The proposed role for medical professionals is similarly a concern. The Bill’s provisions are not fit for purpose around key questions such as who can provide a medical assessment and what happens if a doctor does not believe the requirements for assisted dying have been met.

Coull continues by questioning the role of solicitors in the law:

“We also have concerns that the role of solicitors outlined in the Bill may not be appropriate or in the best interests of the terminally ill person. Solicitors are called on to act as proxies to sign documents on behalf of people who cannot do so for themselves.

“This is primarily a notarial function, but the Bill requires that the solicitor reaches a judgement of the person’s understanding of the effect of the document. We are seriously concerned that a legal professional may not be the best person to make judgements on capacity. 

Finally Coull questions the length of time before the law would be reviewed:

“We note that the Bill would require review after five years, which in our view is far too long a period. Given the gravity and impact of the subject matter, it is imperative that the legislation can be updated in response to issues which come to light as soon as possible after it passes.”

Scotland needs to fully examine what has happened with Canada's euthanasia law and then reject legalizing it. People need Care not Death.

Pressure to expand New Jersey assisted suicide law.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Dana Difilippo reported for the New Jersey Monitor on August 28, 2024 that the assisted suicide lobby is pressuring the New Jersey government to expand their assisted suicide law. Difilippo reports:

Since New Jersey lawmakers passed an aid-in-dying law five years ago, the number of terminally ill patients who have sought to end their lives by self-administered medication has jumped almost tenfold.

Now, advocates are working on two fronts to push state policymakers to “course-correct” the law and make it more accessible to people nearing death with unbearable pain and suffering.

They want to abolish a provision in the law that restricts it to New Jersey residents. Two terminally ill patients from Delaware and Pennsylvania and two New Jersey doctors sued the state last summer, calling the residency restriction discriminatory and unconstitutional.

They also want state legislators to move on a stalled bill that would allow doctors to waive the mandatory 15-day waiting period after patients’ initial requests for life-ending medication. The wait was meant as a safeguard but instead has become a barrier, supporters say.

As I have written in previous articles, nearly every US State that has legalized assisted suicide later expanded their law (Link to article).

According to Difilippo the assisted suicide lobby is pressuring the New Jersey government to waive the waiting period and remove the residency requirement. The waiting period protects people from dying at the low point in their life while the residency requirement prevents the state from becoming a suicide tourist destination. 

Difilippo reports that assisted suicide deaths have grown steadily in New Jersey:

In the past five years, doctors in New Jersey have evaluated and approved almost 300 people to end their lives by self-administering prescribed medication, with the number steadily climbing from 12 in 2019 to 101 last year, according to the Office of the Chief State Medical Examiner.

Herb Conaway Jr (D-Burlington) who has sponsored the bill to expand the New Jersey assisted suicide law admits that assisted suicide laws will expand over time. Difilippo reports:

“Most laws need to be adjusted at one point or another, driven by the data that we accumulate in the wake of the initial passage,” Conaway said.

Difilippo reported that Corinne Carey, the Senior campaign director for the assisted suicide lobby stated:

Most states that have legalized aid-in-dying used Oregon’s law as their blueprint, but the waiting period is a “remnant” of that pioneering law that many have since eliminated, Carey said.

The assisted suicide lobby launched a lawsuit to remove the New Jersey state assisted suicide residency requirement.

Last August, two terminally ill women from neighboring states filed a federal lawsuit looking to end New Jersey’s residency requirement for aid-in-dying.

Plaintiffs Judith Govatos, a Wilmington, Delaware, resident with stage-4 lymphoma, and Andy Sealy, a Philadelphia resident with metastatic breast cancer, wanted to apply for life-ending medication under New Jersey’s law but couldn’t because of the residency requirement, according to the complaint.

Pasik, founder of New Jersey Death with Dignity, and Dr. Paul Bryman, a geriatrician and medical director of a Camden County hospice, joined as plaintiffs, saying the requirement prevents them from treating out-of-state patients because of potential criminal or civil liability.

Attorney General Matt Platkin asked a judge in January to dismiss the case. There has been no ruling on that motion.

Unlike Oregon and Vermont that withdrew their state assisted suicide residency requirement after the assisted suicide lobby challenged it in court, New Jersey Attorney General Platkin is defending the assisted suicide residency requirement.

EPC August 30 Webinar - The Rise of Euthanasia in Canada: From Exceptional to Routine.

Alexander Raikin

Register for the EPC August 30th webinar - The Rise of Euthanasia in Canada: From Exceptional to Routine. with Alexander Raikin, Rebecca Vachon and Alex Schadenberg.

When: Aug 30, 2024 02:00 PM Eastern Time.

Register in advance for this meeting: (Registration Link).

Alexander Raikin, who is a visiting Fellow in Bioethics at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, published an excellent research report on the Rise of Euthanasia in Canada that was published by Cardus on August 7, 2024. 

You may want to read the report in advance. (Link to the report).

Rebecca Vachon

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition is pleased to provide a webinar with Alexander Raikin, Rebecca Vachon, Health Program Director with Cardus and Alex Schadenberg to discuss and share this exceptional research report.

The Raikin will present the data with some discussion on the topic. There will be time for questions and answers.

Raikin, examines the change in the attitude towards euthanasia in Canada under the title: The Rise of Euthanasia. 

Alex Schadenberg

Among other areas, Raikin looks at the increase in the number of euthanasia deaths, how the law doesn't reflect the law's original intent, the lack of oversight of the law, and the lack of effective reporting of the law.

Article by Alex Schadenberg - The Rise of Euthanasia study (Link).

This webinar will be informative for everyone who participates.

Register in advance for this meeting: (Registration Link).

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information on how to join the meeting.

Assisted Suicide Laws Based On the Oregon Model Disproportionately impacts people with disabilities

This article was published by Not Dead Yet on August 23, 2024.

The Oregon model embodies the “better off dead than disabled” ethos in thin disguise.

Lisa Blumberg

By Lisa Blumberg, JD

In 2014, in connection with whether assisted suicide laws would ever be expanded to include people with cognitive decline, Barbara Coombs Lee, then director of Compassion & Choices, said, “It is an issue for another day but is no less compelling.” This was a momentary slip.

The political strategy of Compassion & Choices, the primary organizational proponent of legalized assisted suicide, has always been to sell the concept to state legislatures by asserting that it would only be an option for the dying. They advocate for the Oregon model where eligibility for a lethal prescription is limited to those who due to a terminal illness have less than six months to live. The argument goes that assisted suicide has nothing to do with disabled people except those who happen to be dying.

Scratch the surface and the picture is different. Legalized assisted suicide has a disproportionate impact on people with disabilities for several reasons.

First, virtually all people who are terminally ill have health related functional impairments. The leading reasons why individuals choose assisted suicide are disability related and psychosocial in nature such as perceptions of lessened autonomy. One study indicates that a fear of going into a nursing home – which is a quite reasonable fear for many people with disabilities – is much more likely to fuel a desire to hasten death than pain. In other words, people think about suicide not because death may be near but because they are unsure about how to deal with the practical problems and devaluation that come with needing help or accommodation in daily activities. As Vincenzo Piscopo, CEO of United Spinal Association has said, 

“inadequate resources to provide home care and fear of being a financial or care burden is the motivation for overwhelmed severely disabled people to kill themselves.”

Of the 884 people who died by ingesting lethal drugs obtained under California’s assisted suicide law in 2023, 45 people were reported to have ALS, 24 had Parkinson’s disease and 8 multiple sclerosis. The hallmark of these conditions, although they may have end stages, is physical disability.

The second reason is that for purposes of determining eligibility, doctors may take a very expansive view of what constitutes terminal illness. One example is anorexia. A Colorado doctor, who has provided lethal prescriptions to three young people with anorexia, has spearheaded an effort to recognize a new clinical disorder called “terminal anorexia”, which would apply to the small fraction of patients for whom “recovery remains elusive”. As recounted in the New York Times, the motivation for the label was that it would give people “a formal diagnostic acknowledgment that they were dying, making it easier for them to access hospice care — and even, should they want it, and should they live in a state where it is legal for terminally ill patients, and should their physicians be willing, a physician-assisted death.” This is circular reasoning. In my opinion, it is prognosis by semantics. Fortunately, there has been considerable pushback by both health professionals and advocates.

In Colorado in 2023 though, 9 people died by assisted suicide where the terminal condition was identified as “severe protein calorie malnutrition.” Before 2021, no such cases were reported. In California in 2023, 11 people reported to have endocrine, nutritional and metabolic disease died by assisted suicide. It is not known how many of these people in these states had eating disorders or restricted caloric intake for other reasons.

Third, the ethicist Thaddeus Pope promotes voluntarily stopping eating and drinking (VSED) as a “bridge” to assisted suicide under the Oregon model. He has described a case in Oregon where a woman with early dementia, who didn’t qualify for assisted suicide any other way, used VSED with the help and support of her medical team for four days whereupon she was diagnosed with the “terminal disease” of dehydration. She requested a lethal prescription and promptly received it, with the waiting period between the two requests being waived, because she now had a short life expectancy (without treatment). Pope is candid that she made herself terminally ill as determined by her doctors and is untroubled by it.

Every competent adult has the right to decide what to eat and drink and whether to eat or drink at all. The issue here is selectively promoting VSED as a back doorway to assisted suicide. This would mean that with a doctor’s cooperation, any significantly disabled person could meet eligibility criteria by manipulating circumstances to become terminally ill. Indeed, the idea of medical complicity in making someone eligible for assisted suicide is extremely chilling and has obvious implications for the whole disabled community.

The fourth reason is that in large part due to the health disparities we are subject to, people with disabilities face a greater incidence of physical and mental ailments, including obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, addiction, and mental distress, as well as increased rates of morbidity and mortality. According to a piece in Stat, nearly half of people with disabilities say they are in bad health. Statistically, this means people with pre-existing disabilities become eligible for assisted suicide under the Oregon model before others do. Moreover, suicide prevention services are among the health care services that we struggle to access. It is a perfect storm.

None of this is surprising. The premise of assisted suicide laws is that a person’s health status may make it reasonable for them to kill themself. The Oregon model embodies the “better off dead than disabled” ethos in thin disguise.

Assisted Suicide Promoters Want It to Be Normalized

This article was published by National Review online on August 22, 2024.

Wesley Smith

By Wesley J Smith

Doctors killed more than 15,000 people in Canada in 2023. I think that’s a terrible toll that should concern even supporters of euthanasia. But in California, some assisted-suicide boosters are upset that a similar number of Californians didn’t end their own lives by assisted suicide. In other words, they see Canada’s gob-smacking statistic as aspirational.

And now, assisted-suicide activists, such as board member of End of Life Choices California Adrian Byram, want to catch up. From “Few Californians Choose Medical Aid in Dying. Here’s What We Can Learn from Canada“:

California and Canada have about the same number of people — 39 million in California, 35 million in Canada. Both jurisdictions legalized medical aid in dying in 2016. Both have similar medical systems — many older people are entitled to mostly free medical care, physicians are free to choose their patients and the services they provide. Yet in 2022, 13,241 Canadians took advantage of medical aid in dying, while only 853 Californians did so. Why the big difference?

Byram was so disturbed by the difference that he commissioned a study:

We found two factors that may explain the 15-fold disparity between California and Canada.

First, only 25 percent of Californians aged 60 and over even know that medical aid in dying is their legal right, compared to 67 percent of all older Canadians.

Second, and possibly contributing to the first, is a major difference in the way Californian and Canadian health care institutions inform the public about medical aid in dying.

Correct. In Canada, doctors suggest being killed to their patients. Imagine what that would feel like! Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.

Not so in California:

It appears the institutions are reluctant to mention medical aid in dying, even though they are willing to describe other services like hospice that are available only to people equally close to death.

There is evidence that physicians are also reluctant to mention medical aid in dying when discussing options with a terminally ill patient for fear of upsetting the patient.

Well, assisted suicide isn’t really health care. But I digress.

The answer to too few suicides? Doctors and hospitals should publicize the agenda:

Are thousands of Californians each year missing out on a legal right to control their suffering or at least to make a fully informed choice? To better inform Californians, we must encourage our state health department and our health care institutions to have information readily available on their websites about how to access medical aid in dying. Likewise, we need providers to respect patient autonomy by ensuring we are fully informed about all the legally approved end-of-life choices, including medical aid in dying.

This column proves the lie that assisted suicide is really thought of by its boosters as merely a “rare” option. Activists want assisted suicide normalized well beyond the terminally ill so that we become euthanasia enthusiasts — as in Canada, where euthanasia is the fifth-leading cause of death, and rising. Indeed, almost every state that legalized assisted suicide has already liberalized their laws.

That’s the debate we should be having, not the phony-baloney nonsense of assisted suicide as just a teensy change in medical ethics.

Veterans Affairs Canada tried to cover up euthanasia scandal.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Sheila Gunn Reid, an investigative reporter with Rebel News, has uncovered an attempt by Veterans Affairs Canada attempted to hide a paper trail of evidence relating to case workers suggesting that veterans "choose" to access the Medical Assistance in Dying program. 

Gunn Reid obtained the documents by filing access to information requests and published an exclusive report on August 20, 2024 with Rebel News.

Sheila Gunn Reid

Gunn Reid reports:

Nearly a dozen veterans experiencing acute post-traumatic stress disorder or asking for access to daily living to deal with their service-related injuries came forward over recent years to say that their Veterans Affairs Canada case workers suggested a medically assisted death to them.

At first, Veterans Affairs Canada and Minister Lawrence MacAulay claimed that just one case worker working out of one office was responsible for the scandal. However, as more veterans came forward, it became evident that other offices and case workers were involved.

Gunn Reid decided to find out exactly what happened by filing access to information requests. She learned the following:

We can see attempts to cover up and then to backtrack. On page 21, we can see in the media lines that Veterans Affairs officials were planning to claim there were no other incidents of Veterans Affairs staff telling veterans to kill themselves. They had to remove that from their talking points because other veterans came forward.

Staff also claimed that the other cases were just veterans calling to ask about whether getting assisted suicide would kill their benefits since it would count as self-harming.

Gunn Reid reports that on page 679 the documents state that they decided to only provide verbal updates because it doesn't create a paper trail. On page 1219 they were concerned about how to respond to inquiries from Rebel News. On page 1220 they decide not to provide Veterans Affairs Minister MacAulay with the number of veterans who were advised to be killed by MAiD.

Gunn Reid reports:

we can see just how out of touch these Veterans Affairs communications people are with normal people living in the outside world beyond the machinery of the Liberal government, everyday people who think veterans need care and not state-sanctioned homicide.

The documents state:

“Hello all, it's interesting to follow the thrice-daily media report emails to see how far the main story is traveling. Yesterday, it was reported by a couple of US news outlets, and today, it is in the UK Daily Mail,” the documents say.

“It is interesting to see how much coverage it's getting,” the bureaucrats continue. “I had wondered if there would be anyone else to come out of the woodwork to say it had happened to them too but so far nothing (thankfully).”

It should be concerning to veterans that Canada's euthanasia lobby has launched a court case to force the federal government to permit euthanasia for mental health issues alone. The lives of veterans are at risk.

Gunn Reid has not completed her examination of the documents from Veterans Affairs that she received through access to information. 

Canada's Euthanasia lobby launches court case to extend euthanasia to mental illness alone.

Based on the Netherlands where 1.7% of all euthanasia deaths were for mental illness alone, if permitted, there could have been 255 euthanasia deaths for mental illness alone in Canada in 2023.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director,
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Dying with Dignity, Canada's leading euthanasia lobby group, launched a court case on August 19, 2024 to force Canada to extend euthanasia to mental illness alone. This recent court challenge proves how extreme Canada's euthanasia lobby is and how they have redefined the meaning of the words compassion and equality.

The euthanasia lobby falsely believe that the Supreme Court of Canada, Carter decision (2015), created a right to euthanasia, (which it did not) and that the Carter decision also required Canada to permit euthanasia for mental illness alone (which it did not). 

Stephanie Taylor reported for The Canadian Press that:

An application filed by Dying with Dignity in Ontario Superior Court on Monday argues that it is discriminatory to bar people with mental disorders from being eligible for an assisted death when it is available to people who suffer physically.

The euthanasia lobby has launched a Charter challenge to force Canada to extend euthanasia to people with mental illness alone based on equality. The Dying with Dignity press release states:

The continued exclusion reinforces the stigma and historic prejudice against people with mental illness. It violates section 15 of the Charter by discriminating on the basis of the type of disability experienced. It also violates section 7 of the Charter by denying people with a mental illness the freedom to make fundamental decisions about their body and life; this denial is overbroad. The differential treatment of people whose sole condition is a mental illness minimizes the enduring and intolerable suffering that some individuals experience and undermines their full participation in the range of choices that are available to all other people across Canada.

The Dying with Dignity media release justifies euthanasia for mental illness by stating:

In fact, of the 8,042 assisted deaths in The Netherlands in 2023, 138 (1.7%) were because the primary medical condition was a mental illness.

I have predicted that there were more than 15,000 Canadian assisted deaths in 2023. If Canada approves euthanasia for mental illness alone, based on the Netherlands euthanasia data of 1.7% of all euthanasia deaths were for mental illness alone, there may have been 255 euthanasia deaths (1.7%) for mental illness alone in Canada in 2023.

The reality is that Canadians with mental illness are already being killed by euthanasia, even when their primary purpose for seeking death is a mental illness, so long as the person has a co-morbidity that enables the doctor or nurse practitioner to approve the death.

The issue of euthanasia for mental illness alone has always been part of the euthanasia debate. The original law (Bill C-14) that was passed in June 2016 excluded euthanasia for mental illness alone and it required that a person's "natural death be reasonably foreseeable" (which was not defined). Essentially Bill C-14 required that a person had to have a terminal condition in order to be approved to be killed.

In March 2021, the federal government expanded Canada's euthanasia law by passing Bill C-7. C-7 removed the requirement in the law that a person's "natural death be reasonably foreseeable", it removed the 10-day waiting period for people who were terminally ill, it added a 90-day waiting for people who were not terminally ill and it approved euthanasia for mental illness alone, but added a two year moratorium on euthanasia for mental illness alone to establish guidelines around this new category of killing.

Since then the federal government has twice delayed the implementation of euthanasia for mental illness alone with the most recent legislation (Bill C-62) delaying it until March 17, 2027.

When Canada passed Bill C-7 and eliminated the requirement that a person have a terminal condition to be approved to be killed, the result has been stories of Canadians with disabilities seeking or dying by euthanasia based on poverty, homelessness or an inability to access necessary medical treatments.

Similar to Canadians with disabilities, Canadians living with mental illness are also more likely to live in poverty or homeless and they often have difficulties accessing necessary medical treatments. In some communities, a person with mental illness will wait more than 90 days to be seen by a mental health specialist, and yet the law permits euthanasia for non-terminally ill people with a 90-day waiting period.

This is the second Charter challenge launched by Dying with Dignity. On June 17, 2024 Dying with Dignity launched a Charter challenge to force all medical institutions to provide euthanasia.

The Dying with Dignity lawsuit proves how extreme that the euthanasia lobby in Canada has become.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition will seek to intervene in this court case.

Important articles on this topic: 

• Euthanasia Prevention Coalition says that the expansion of euthanasia to include mental illness should be scrapped (Link).
• Treat people with mental health problems, don't kill them (Link).
• Provincial Health Ministers urge the Federal government to indefinitely pause euthanasia for mental illness alone (Link).
• Euthanasia for those with mental illness should not be on the table (Link).
• Euthanasia for mental illness should never come to pass (Link). 
• Canada's euthanasia law. We've already gone too far. (Link). 
• Canada has revealed the horror of assisted dying (Link). 
• Canada must put the brakes on euthanasia for mental illness (Link).
• Don't abandon people to death by euthanasia (MAiD) (Link)
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Study finds that 25% of unresponsive patients have hidden consciousness.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Brain scans related to "hidden consciousness"

A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine on August 14 titled: Cognitive Motor Dissociation in Disorders of Consciousness found that 25% of people who are diagnosed as unconscious are actually conscious. The study calls this a state of "hidden consciousness."

Michael Irving provided an explanation of the study that was published by New Atlas on August 16. Irving states:

After a severe brain injury, such as trauma or a stroke, patients can enter a state where they stop responding to stimuli in their environment, such as sound, light, pain and instructions. This can include a comatose state, which is like a persistent deep sleep; a vegetative state, where the patient may appear awake and even have their eyes open, but still don’t respond; and a minimally conscious state, where patients may even track movement with their eyes but can’t respond to commands.

But this doesn’t necessarily mean these patients aren’t at least partially aware of what’s going on. Over the past few decades scientists have detected signs of “hidden consciousness” in some unresponsive patients. In tests, instructions like “imagine opening and closing your hand” were given to patients while their brain activity was being monitored through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) or electroencephalography (EEG). 

Brain scans comparing consciousness.

Irving reported that the lead author of the study, Yelena Bodien stated:

“Some patients with severe brain injury do not appear to be processing their external world,” 

“However, when they are assessed with advanced techniques such as task-based fMRI and EEG, we can detect brain activity that suggests otherwise. These results bring up critical ethical, clinical, and scientific questions – such as how can we harness that unseen cognitive capacity to establish a system of communication and promote further recovery?”

Irving reported the findings from the study:

The new study examined 241 participants from six different facilities across the US, UK and Europe, over the past 15 years. They were all unresponsive in either comatose, vegetative or minimally conscious states, tested with fMRI, EEG or both, anywhere from a few days to years after sustaining their injury.

Intriguingly, the study found that as many as 25% of the patients were able to repeatedly follow instructions over the course of several minutes. That’s higher than the estimates raised in previous studies, which suggested 15 to 20%.

The authors admit that the research was not standardized and the methods for testing are complicated, nonetheless, the outcome is significant. 

Many people who are unresponsive are denied beneficial treatment because the treatment is deemed to be disproportionate or extra-ordinary, based on the condition of the patient.

Some people, like Professor Peter Singer, deny that these people are persons because they have lost their cognitive ability.

These people are often referred to as "vegetative" are not only denied beneficial treatment but they are often denied food and water and intentionally killed by dehydration.

The woman who confessed to killing her disabled son 40 years ago has died.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Child euthanasia is infanticide

A UK woman who admitted to killing her 7 year old son more than 40 years ago by intentionally overdosing him as part of a campaign to legalize of euthanasia in the UK has recently passed away.

I recently learned that Antonya Cooper (77) died soon after she admitted to killing her son.

Harriett Sherwood reported for the Guardian on July 3 that:

A woman has admitted giving her terminally ill seven-year-old child a huge dose of morphine to end his suffering more than 40 years ago.

Antonya Cooper said her son Hamish had experienced “horrendous suffering and intense pain” as a result of his stage four cancer and “beastly” treatment.

“On Hamish’s last night, when he said he was in a lot of pain, I said: ‘Would you like me to remove the pain?’ and he said: ‘Yes please, mama’,” Cooper, 77, told BBC Radio Oxford.

“And through his Hickman Catheter, I gave him a large dose of morphine that did quietly end his life.”

I share sympathy concerning the suffering Hamish experienced, there were other options than killing him. Hamish needed pain and symptom management. He needed care not to be killed.

Cooper's admission to killing her disabled son is a warning as to why euthanasia should never be legal. Hamish was a child who was not capable of consenting.

Further to that, euthanasia is not legal in the UK and yet Cooper is promoting the case for expanding the law to killing children.

Ohio man charged with assisting the suicide of his wife.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Ardis Macaulay

Jen Balduf reported for the Dayton Daily News on August 12 that Thomas Stuart Macaulay (78) of Ohio was charged in Greene County Common Pleas Court with two counts of assisted suicide.

Greene County prosecutor, David Hayes confirmed the assisted suicide charges in connection to the March 28 death of Macaulay’s wife, Ardis Susanne Macaulay (75). Hayes stated that:

“Assisted suicide is against the policy of the state of Ohio,”

Ohio Revised Code 3795.04 states that assisted suicide is “providing the physical means by which the other person commits or attempts to commit suicide” or; “participating in a physical act by which the other person commits or attempts to commit suicide.”

Balduf reported that:

Yellow Springs police responded around 3:20 a.m. March 28 to Aspen Court after Thomas Macaulay reported that his wife died, and that it was a nitrogen-induced suicide. He said she chose to end her life, according to a call log.

One of the responding officers reported he found Ardis Macaulay “visibly deceased, laying on a … recliner with an inflated translucent clothing bag over her head connected to an air tank.”

Thomas Macaulay told officers he had been with his wife. He said he did not participate in the suicide but that they had been planning it, according to the police report.

Inside the house officers found a suicide-type note on the table next to the recliner and instructions on how to die by suicide through nitrogen gas poisoning, the report stated.

Balduf reported that:

Macaulay, a retired Wright State University sculpture professor, is free on his own recognizance and is next scheduled to appear in court Sept. 6 for a pretrial hearing.

Police will need to prove that Macaulay assisted the suicide of his wife or if it were actually a homicide that he has claimed was an assisted suicide.

There have been many cases of spousal homicide where the perpetrator claimed that the act was an assisted suicide or euthanasia/"mercy killing."

Stephen Miller

This year, Stephen P. Miller, of Tucson Arizona, a former doctor and advisory board member with the group Choice and Dignity, was arrested and charged with manslaughter and assisting a suicide in the death of Doreen Brodhead (59) in a New York motel in November 2023

A case from Montecello New York, Andrew Moore claimed that he strangled to death his mother, Margaret Regalia, as part of an assisted suicide pact.

In 2010 I wrote an article titled: Homicide or "Mercy Killing" in response to another spousal homicide case in New York.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition will closely follow this case.

Training doctors and medical students to kill by assisted death.

The following article was published by National Review online on August 17, 2024

By Wesley J Smith

“Nor shall any man’s entreaty prevail upon me to administer poison to anyone; neither will I counsel any man to do so.” So says the Hippocratic Oath.

Alas, the oath is as dead as the patients some doctors now assist in suicide. In California, the Sutter Family Residency Medical Program even offers residencies to train doctors in assisted suicide — euphemistically called medical aid in dying (MAID).

Chillingly, most of the doctors who participated in a small study on assisted suicide and who prescribe poison as part of their job like it. The study was published in Academic Medicine, the journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges, which pushes the assisted-suicide-training agenda:

The authors surveyed 28 graduates and collected data from 21 former residents (response rate, 75%). Of these 21 former residents, 17 (81%) reported having opted to receive training in MAID during residency. Of the 12 residents who received training and were currently practicing in a location that allowed MAID, 7 (58%) were still practicing aid in dying, and of these 7 residents, 5 (71%) reported that their aid-in-dying work was more rewarding than their other clinical responsibilities.

More rewarding than healing patients, extending their lives, and palliating their pain? Good grief. This reminds me of that Canadian doctor “whose face lights up” when describing having killed more than 400 people, telling a reporter that providing lethal injections is “the most fulfilling work she has ever done.”

Participating residents get hands-on experience in poison-prescribing

The case load for residents acting as the prescribing physician is monitored by the faculty to ensure a relatively even distribution. Aid-in-dying cases are precepted with any of the MAID-trained preceptors. If fulfilling the prescriber role, residents typically have 2 separate appointments with a given patient, whereas those acting as the consultant typically only have 1 appointment. Residents fulfilling the prescriber role are additionally expected to coordinate the patient’s care and set up the consultant visit, often with a fellow resident. They are also expected to facilitate discussions and coordinate the timing of prescription and ingestion with the patient, patient’s family, and hospice agencies. Residents are encouraged to attend the planned death of at least 1 of their MAID patients during residency, although this is not required.

Apparently medical students and newly graduated doctors want such training, with many also wanting to participate in assisted suicide:

This lack of MAID-trained clinicians is in clear contrast to the desire for such training among medical students and residents. In studies of Canadian trainees, between 41% and 71% reported being willing to provide MAID care. In a 2021 survey of U.S. internal medicine residents, Pham et al reported that 81% were interested in receiving MAID training, with 34% responding they would be likely to participate in MAID after graduating, and a 2001 survey of U.S. surgical residents found that 87% would be willing to assist in the death of a patient with terminal cancer.

Yikes.

Still, most doctors today do not participate where such practices are legal. None should. And the fewer who do, the less it will be normalized.

That seems precisely the circumstance that the push to increase assisted-suicide residency programs is designed to overcome:

Although demand for MAID training in residency is high, access to this training more broadly is limited. These preliminary data suggest that implementation of a MAID curriculum in residency training may be effective at producing MAID-practicing clinicians, but more research must be performed to assess the generalizability of this training model to other residency training programs. This assessment can only be accomplished through a broad dissemination of residency MAID curricula. . . .

Overall, we found preliminary evidence that suggests such training is highly desirable among residents and may be effective at producing MAID-practicing physicians after residency. This report also provides the basic structure of a residency MAID curriculum for implementation at other residency programs.

Great efforts are being made by activists and media to normalize assisted suicide as the most “dignified” means of dying. And now, we can see that this agenda has extended to include a push to increase the training of doctors in this practice, with the apparent support of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

This leads us to a pressing question: If doctors become assisted-suicide boosters — again, as has already happened in Canada, where MDs are now urged to suggest euthanasia — who will be left to protect vulnerable patients?

Couple euthanasia is modern sati.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Meghan McCallum wrote an article that appears to promote Duo-euthanasia that was published in mdlinx.com on August 15, 2024.

The article titled: Duo-euthanasia: To avoid facing life alone, focuses on how the spouse of a person who dies by euthanasia will often experience complicated grief and will have a higher potential rate of premature death. The article states:

For some individuals, euthanasia or physician-assisted dying (aka PAD or EAS) presents an option to end one’s life with some control and dignity while minimizing pain and suffering. Whether they are experiencing severe chronic pain, mobility challenges, or serious illness such as cancer, these people may be intrigued by the possibility of euthanasia or physician-assisted dying.

But for the surviving spouses, facing the future without their lifelong partner can feel overwhelming, and their quality of life may plummet.

The article states:

Patients may consider or request information about euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide (EAS) as a way to take control of their death and dying experience and to end their pain and suffering. While this option presents a way for patients to die with dignity in the manner of their choosing, their death also creates challenges and risks for their spouse or partner. It is important to discuss all the risks and benefits with both partners and patients considering EAS.

History insists on repeating itself. In the past, some Hindu women would throw themselves on the funeral pyre (known as sati) to die with their husband. India banned the practise of sati.

But now the euthanasia lobby appears to be promoting a modern sati, that being couples dying by lethal poison. Similar to sati, some women "chose" to die on the funeral pyre while others were compelled to die.

By promoting couple euthanasia McCallum is undermining the nature of the human person, that being, to receive care and support from the community while grieving. 

Killing is not caring.

Spanish judge prevents euthanasia of 23-year-old woman.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

On August 8 I reported that the father of a 23 year-old woman, in Spain, has challenged in court the approval of euthanasia for his daughter. The father argued in the court that his daughter, who is living with a partial paralysis, lacked the capacity to decide to be killed by euthanasia.

The woman was scheduled to be killed by euthanasia on August 2 but the judge suspended the death until a higher court can hear the case.

Faharas.net reported on August 15 that the same judge has recently suspended the death of another person, a man (54) who has had three strokes and two heart attacks. Both cases were brought to court by family members who questioned the euthanasia approval.

Christian Daily reported on August 15 that the judge suspended the euthanasia death of the 23-year-old woman because, as stated:

"I do not consider that there is a serious, chronic and disabling condition which, as the law describes, is the situation that refers to limitations that directly affect the physical autonomy and activities of daily living,”

It appears that the parameters of the Spanish law will be determined, over time, by the courts.

Quebec man with long covid seeks death by euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Katrine Desautels reported for the The Canadian Press on August 14, 2024 that Sébastien Verret (44) is seeking a death by (MAiD) euthanasia based on long covid. 

Desautels reported that Verret is:

living with long COVID for more than three years, has requested medical assistance in dying (MAID) because he says he is exhausted, tired of being in pain and considers himself a burden to his family who are caring for him.

Desautels reported that:

When he first contracted the virus, Verret struggled with chronic fatigue and strobe lights caused him to have seizures and tremble. One night, he fell to the floor in a seizure and his smart watch called for help. “That was my first of many ambulance rides,” he said.

Over time, he had more seizures, fatigue, and nausea.

“The symptoms built up and instead of getting better, they got worse,”

Lately Verret's condition has become worse:

Since January 2024, Verret has been suffering from urinary incontinence, which meant he had trouble controlling his bladder and had to wash his bed frequently. Housework became a burden again.

“Changing the bed, for me, feels like running 10 km,” he said.

His youngest son started making him meals while he was there.

“Looking back, it’s abnormal that my child, who was 14, would make me meals. It was abnormal that he was my caregiver,” he said. “I was so weak that for the second time in a year, I gave up the accommodation. I asked the children’s mother to take them back. It was very hard for me,” he explained.

Last battle

In June 2024, he found himself in the emergency room again, this time accompanied by his parents who had mentioned to staff that they wanted their son to be placed with special resources.

“As much as it’s abnormal that my son is the one taking care of me, it’s also abnormal that at 44, it’s my mother who comes to change my bed full of (feces),” said Verret.

Verret says that he could continue to live with homecare but he was turned down for homecare, Desautels reported:

“I would like the government to wake up and give us help with domestic tasks (…) to relax the rules for the program. That’s the solution. The six months I spent with my parents, I got back on my feet, and I had hope. I was almost ready to go back to work with a job that corresponded to my new reality,” he explained.

Desautels also reported that:

Emmanuelle Marceau, associate professor at the Université de Montréal’s (UdeM) School of Public Health pointed out that quality of life is subjective to each person.

“What is a life worth living? Is a life with a lot of physical suffering and little hope of change no longer worth it,” said Marceau, who’s also an associate researcher at the Centre for Research in Ethics (CRÉ). “With the opening of medical assistance in dying, there is a fear that people will feel that they no longer have a meaning. They no longer have a contribution for their loved ones, for their family, on the contrary, they see that they are preventing them. I think we must question someone who would like MAID for these reasons. At that point, we can ask ourselves as a society: aren’t we abandoning the most vulnerable?”

The story of Sebastien Verret confirms how people are being abandoned to death by the medical system and then further abandoned with death by euthanasia.

Euthanasia was sold to the culture as concerning autonomous free choices. When a person is not provided their basic needs, the decision is neither autonomous nor a free choice.

The dystopian horror of the Sarco suicide pod

This article was published by Spiked on August 13, 2024

Kevin Yuill

By Kevin Yuill

Yuill is an emeritus professor of history at the University of Sunderland and CEO of Humanists Against Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia (HAASE).

This creepy death capsule reveals the dark heart of ‘assisted dying’.

Introducing the Sarco suicide pod, a gleaming and futuristic-looking death machine. The Sarco, short for ‘sarcophagus’, is the real-life, 21st-century version of critic William Archer’s fictional street-corner slot machines, ‘by which a man could kill himself for a penny’.

The Sarco, a 3D-printed death capsule, was developed a few years ago by Dr Philip Nitschke, founder of assisted-suicide advocacy organisation Exit International, and engineer Alexander Bannink. First unveiled in 2019, the Sarco works by filling its chamber with nitrogen and reducing oxygen levels rapidly once a button is activated from inside. The process would allow a person to lose consciousness and die in approximately 10 minutes. It’s cheap, at just $20 a pop. It’s disability-friendly, in that it can also be activated by voice, a blink or a gesture. It’s also environmentally friendly, serving as a coffin as well as a suicide pod.

Nitschke sees the Sarco as empowering. He claims it will make assisted suicide as unassisted as possible – or as he put it in 2022, ‘You really don’t need a doctor to die’.

Last month, the Sarco was about to serve its first customer, a terminally ill Australian man, in Valais, Switzerland. But after the news broke, a precautionary ban was issued on the Sarco’s use.

The precautionary ban is not a surprise. Very few support the use of the Sarco, even among those who generally campaign for the ‘right to die’. This is a little perplexing at first glance. After all, you would think champions of assisted dying would be all over the Sarco pod (if not actually in it). But they’re not. Even in Switzerland, a nation with some of the most lax assisted-dying laws in the world, established right-to-die organisations have opposed it. As a spokesperson for life-ending clinic Lifecircle said in 2021, ‘there is no human warmth with this method’.

It’s the same story in the UK. Dignity in Dying, the well-funded campaign group for legalising assisted dying, may claim to share Nitschke’s dream of making assisted dying as unassisted as possible – ‘Dying people not doctors in control’, states Dignity in Dying on its website. But it has also come out in opposition to the Sarco. As Professor Stephen Duckworth, a campaigner closely associated with Dignity in Dying, stated in 2021, he could not support the Sarco. ‘Nor am I aware of any credible assisted-dying campaigner who does’, he sniffed. Apparently it ‘deprives users of human connection’. It is the ‘antithesis of what the choice of assisted dying represents’.

What is it about the Sarco that provokes such a reaction among assisted-dying campaigners? At $20, it’s much cheaper than other forms of assisted dying. Above all, it seems to give people the very thing assisted-dying champions claim to support – the right to choose. So why do they reject the very innovation that meets their objectives?

The reason is simple. It’s because the Sarco exposes the horrors of euthanasia that hide behind kind-sounding words like ‘assisted dying’ or the ‘right to die’. It makes it all too clear that death could become cheap, easy and accessible should we decide to go down this path.

The Sarco offers a glimpse into a dystopian future that we desperately need to reject. However unwittingly, the near-universal repulsion it has elicited has done society a great service.

Further articles on this topic:

• Nitschke's suicide business gets US tax deductible status (Link).
• The media are promoting Nitschke and Sarco again (Link).
• Switzerland has not approved suicide pod (Link).