Denmark committee recommends the legalization of euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, 

Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Even though Denmark's Ethics council, overwhelming rejected the legalization of euthanasia in October 2023, the majority of a Danish committee recently recommended the legalization of euthanasia.

The Local Denmark reported on October 4, 2023 that Denmark's Ethics Council advised the Denmark parliament not to legalise euthanasia. The Local reported that:

An overwhelming majority of the Danish Council on Ethics have advised the country's parliament against voting to legalise euthanasia.

Fully sixteen out seventeen members of the committee concluded in a report that it was "in principle impossible to establish proper regulation of euthanasia", and as a result recommended that the law in Denmark should not be changed to allow people suffering mental or physical distress to receive help to end their own lives.

The ethics council wrote in the full report that:

"The very existence of an offer of euthanasia will decisively change our ideas about old age, the coming of death, quality of life and what it means to take others into account,"

"If euthanasia becomes an option, there is too great a risk that it will become an expectation aimed at special groups in society."

A few days ago, the majority in the "Committee for a more dignified death", submitted its recommendations for what euthanasia could look like in Denmark.

An article by Anders Heissel that was published by DR news reported that:

Seven out of the committee's eight members propose as the first model that "self-selected and self-executed end of life for terminally ill persons" should be introduced.

This means that any person who has a maximum of six months left to live has the right to receive medication prescribed by a doctor with the aim of ending their life themselves.

As the second model, five of the members propose that it should be possible to receive help to end their life from a healthcare professional such as a doctor or a nurse. - This is to respect people's right to self-determination.

Heissel further reported that:

The 'Committee for a more dignified death' was established in September 2023 with 10 members, but two members later left because, according to them, the committee had an "invariable" focus on establishing models for the possible introduction of assisted suicide in Denmark. 

Shortly after the committee was established, a clear recommendation came from the Ethics Council not to introduce active euthanasia, and this was the fourth time in 27 years that four different compositions of the Ethics Council have clearly distanced themselves from introducing active euthanasia. 

Denmark's Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen, is pushing for the legalization of euthanasia.

Based on the world-wide experience with euthanasia, the Danish Ethics Council was correct in October 2023 that it was impossible to properly regulate euthanasia.

Euthanasia is an act that intentionally causes the death of a person upon request. No one should have the right in law to kill another person.

Medical Aid in Dying, language games.

Alex Schadenberg

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The assisted suicide lobby plays word games to convince people that assisting a death by prescribing poison cocktails is not assisted suicide.

The latest word game concerns the phrase Medical Aid in Dying, also known as MAiD.

MAiD is a made in Canada term to describe euthanasia and assisted suicide by using language that is considered more acceptable. The Canadian euthanasia lobby needed a phrase that would make killing people, by euthanasia or assisted suicide, more palatable. They came up with the phrase Medical Aid in Dying also known as MAiD to achieve their goal.

Compassion and Choices (C & C), the leading assisted suicide lobby group in America published an article titled: Medical Aid in Dying is not Assisted Suicide, Suicide or Euthanasia. The (C & C) publication states:

Medical aid in Dying is fundamentally different from euthanasia.

Medical aid in dying is a practice by which a terminally ill, mentally capable person with a prognosis of six months or less chooses to request, obtain and take medication that brings about a peaceful death. In all authorized jurisdictions, only the dying person can request an aid-in-dying prescription under the law, and if and when they decide to ingest the medication, they must self-administer it. Therefore, control stays with the patient from beginning to end.

In contrast, euthanasia, sometimes called “mercy killing,” is an intentional act by which another person (not the dying person) acts to cause death. Euthanasia is illegal throughout the United States, and all medical aid-in-dying laws expressly prohibit euthanasia. Compassion & Choices does not support authorizing euthanasia because it would allow someone else — not the dying person — to cause the death of another.

In Canada, MAiD is the term defining the acts whereby a physician or nurse practitioner either prescribe or directly administer a poison cocktail for the purpose of intentionally causing death. In fact the term MAiD actually constitutes both euthanasia and/or assisted suicide.

So let's get this straight. A made in Canada term (MAiD) that was designed to replace the use of the terms euthanasia or assisted suicide is not euthanasia, assisted suicide. How is euthanasia or assisted suicide not euthanasia or assisted suicide?

C & C obviously likes the term MAiD but it doesn't want to admit that MAiD is euthanasia.

The assisted suicide lobby wants you to believe that prescribing a lethal poison for the purpose of death, is not assisted suicide, it is not suicide, it is not "mercy killing" but rather it is MAiD and by the way, MAiD is not euthanasia, even though in Canada MAiD is euthanasia and assisted suicide.

You can't make this stuff up. But even if you change the use of language the act remains the same.

I'm Sorry My Colleague Killed Your Sister.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

I was cleaning up my emails and came across an excellent article that I remember reading, but that I had missed when blogging. Jeremy Bannon had an published by First Things on May 23, 2025 titled: I'm Sorry My Colleague Killed Your Sister. Bannon wrote:

A few weeks ago, while walking through the halls of the hospital where I work, I ran into the brother of a former patient. I asked him how his sister was doing, having positive memories of journeying alongside her as she recovered from a stroke. He proceeded to inform me that she was “gone.” Saddened, I offered my condolences and asked what had happened. “She went for MAiD,” he said, his gaze drifting into a thousand-yard stare just to my right. “We didn’t agree with her choice, but she said that if she was not able to walk on her own after a year, she was going to go for it.” Sure enough, a year went by and she still was not able to walk on her own. I replied: “I’m sorry my colleague killed your sister.”

As I said it, a wave of sadness hit me, not just for the despair this woman must have felt, but also that a doctor—one who had sworn an oath to “do no harm”—had affirmed her darkest thoughts.

Bannon then writes:

The brother seemed surprised at what I’d said. I told him it had been a pleasure taking care of his sister and assured him that this was not the “medicine” that I had signed up for. He thanked me, almost as if my view of care was a unique approach to “the healing art.” In Canada, it increasingly is.

The curious thing about my “unique” way of practicing medicine—where I refuse to kill my patients—is that it’s actually not unique at all. Historically, medical ethics has always maintained that doctors have no business killing their patients, as evidenced by texts from ancient China, India, and Greece, all the way up to modern times. It was not until 2016 that it became legal in Canada for doctors to kill their patients, and then only for cases that were “grievous,” “irremediable,” and “terminal.” Physicians were assured that “their independent, professional judgment makes them uniquely capable of detecting a patient’s vulnerability.” 

The normal medical practise of not killing patients has in a short period of time shifted to a the normalization of patient homicide. 

Bannon compares Canada's euthanasia program to the California assisted suicide program. Both were legalized in 2016 but Canada, which has a similar population as California, had a little more than 60,000 deaths between legalization and 2023 and in the same time-frame California had almost 4300 assisted suicide deaths. Bannon continues:

The independent investigative panel probing the reason for Canada’s rapid uptick in MAiD deaths found that 428 cases did not meet the criteria for euthanasia, making the deaths legally homicides (and these are only the cases that we know about). But there has been no referral to criminal authorities.

There have been a few instances where provincial police have launched criminal investigations. One woman with an untreated post-concussion syndrome was euthanized without her daughters’ knowledge. Another investigation and subsequent lawsuit found that a bipolar man received MAiD while on a day pass from a hospital stay without anyone’s knowledge. 

Bannon then comments on the fact that the government has already approved euthanasia for mental illness alone, that it has agreed to implement in March 2027. Bannon then comments on the discriminatory nature of the law

The protocol for administering MAiD reveals a sinister view of anyone who is not completely sound in body and mind. If I, in good health, wanted to die and attempted to kill myself, physicians would have the ability, by law, to restrain me against my will and ensure that I receive treatment for this desire to die. But if I was handicapped or ill, then the same physicians could help me end my life. The MAiD system says that the healthy are worthy of suicide prevention, and the disabled and ill are not. This is not just my opinion, but also that of the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights. Furthermore, the U.N.’s Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has formally recommended that Canada repeal its Track 2 MAiD program due to such injustices. The bias doesn’t stop with the sick and disabled: Many Canadian MAiD providers are quietly struggling with euthanasia requests from vulnerable populations, including the poor, homeless, and those living in long-term care homes.

Bannon finishes his article with the axiom:

It is often said that the true measure of a society lies in how it treats its most vulnerable members. By that standard, Canada is a society that is headed down a very dark path.

Thank you Dr Bannon for being opposed to patient homicide.

Ontario report: Euthanasia approvals for patients refusing treatment.

Psychological concerns were also paramount.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Ontario’s MAID Death Review Committee (MDRC) released it's fifth report on August 25, 2025. The MDRC is a body of the Ontario Coroner's Office that is composed of 16 people who are charged with examining Ontario euthanasia reports that may have concerns.

The reports from the MDRC committee concern people who have already died by euthanasia.

Meagan Gillmore wrote an article that was published by Canadian Affairs on August 27 examining the most recent report concerning euthanasia deaths on patients who had refused treatment, or had psychological concerns.

Gillmore begins her article with the story of Mr. C:

A widowed, elderly man with a body tremor was approved for medical assistance in dying (MAID) despite loneliness and poor self-esteem motivating his application, a new report from Ontario’s chief coroner’s office says.

The man, called Mr. C in the report, had an essential tremor, which causes uncontrollable shaking, often of the hands. Tremors are incurable neurological conditions, but not fatal.

Mr. C’s tremors had made it difficult for him to participate in hobbies and social activities. A widower in his 70s, he “did not perceive that he had much to offer in a new relationship” because of the tremor, the report says.

Mr. C said he “experienced profound hopelessness and loneliness” and could not find meaningful relationships or fulfillment after his spouse’s death. His MAID provider noted he applied because of bereavement and emotional suffering.

He was approved for Track 2 MAID, which is MAID for people whose deaths are not reasonably foreseeable.

Mr. C is one of three individuals profiled in a new report by Ontario’s MAID Death Review Committee, which examines how MAID assessors interpret the legal eligibility criteria for MAID.

Gillmore explains that:

Guidance released by Health Canada in 2023 says a patient and doctor must together decide if a patient’s condition is incurable, after considering available treatments and the patient’s overall health and values. Patients are not required to try treatments, but must be informed of means to relieve their suffering.

The guidance says a person cannot make themselves eligible for MAID by refusing all or most available treatments.

The most recent report from the MDRC raises concerns that people are being approved even when it is unclear why they refused all treatments. Gillmore then writes about Mrs A:

In one case, a woman in her 60s was approved for MAID after declining every treatment offered to treat her obesity and related chronic conditions, including type 2 diabetes and depression.

The woman, called Mrs. A, was approved for Track 1 MAID, which is MAID for people whose natural death is reasonably foreseeable.

In the years before her death, Mrs. A refused offers of health care and stopped taking her medications because she “no longer had the will to live,” the report says.

Her MAID assessors believed she would improve with proper health and home care. They offered her weight loss surgery, medication and disability supports. She declined everything, saying they would not help her.

The MDRC committee were divided on Mrs A. Gillmore reports:

Some committee members said Mrs. A should not have been eligible for MAID because she declined all treatments. Some also said it was not clear whether the MAID assessors had determined why she refused treatments.

“MAID legislation requires more than a respect for autonomy, it also mandates the application of clinical expertise to ensure that reasonable care options are considered,” they said.

Other members said Mrs. A’s MAID assessors respected her autonomy and that refusing treatment is a personal decision.

Gillmore states that the report uncovers "ableist concerns" concerning the term "irreversible decline in capability:

Health Canada’s guidance helps MAID assessors determine if a patient has an “irreversible decline in capability.”

According to the guidance, the decline in capability does not need to be related to symptoms of an illness or disability. It can include decreased job opportunities or ability to participate in meaningful activities.

Gillmore then reports on the case of Mr B.

The report tells the story of a man in his 60s, known as Mr. B, who had cerebral palsy and had lived in long-term care for several years.

Mr. B “expressed profound psychological suffering and loneliness,” the report says, which increased when he moved to long-term care.

He used a wheelchair, but was able to push it, transfer out of his chair and toilet himself. He was scared that he would lose those abilities as he aged.

Six to eight weeks before his MAID death, Mr. B voluntarily stopped eating and drinking. The report does not say why or whether MAID assessors tried to determine his reasons for doing so.

In approving him for Track 1 MAID, his assessors said Mr. B’s death was reasonably foreseeable because he had stopped eating and drinking and had signs of kidney failure. His dependency on others showed he was in an “irreversible state of functional decline,” the assessors said.

In other words, Mr. B. stopped eating and drinking to be approved for Track 1 MAiD. Track 1 MAiD is for people who have a terminal condition. There is no waiting period for Track 1 MAiD.

The MDRC committee were divided on Mr B. Gillmore reports:

A few members did not think Mr. B’s dependency and need for long-term care fulfilled that criteria. Needing help is part of many disabilities, including cerebral palsy, they said.

“Framing such dependency as evidence of an irreversible decline in capability potentially risks introducing an ableist perspective, wherein inherent disability-related needs are mischaracterized as functional decline that is aligned with an irreversible trajectory, rather than a person’s basic care needs,” these members said.

The report also raised concerns about unmet psychological needs influencing MAID requests. Gillmore explains:

Currently, the law prohibits eligibility for MAID on the basis of a mental health condition alone.

Gillmore comments on the reports findings concerning psychological suffering.

Yet, Mr. B’s MAID assessors noted his suffering was “primarily psychosocial and existential.” Several committee members said he should have had a psychiatric assessment to determine whether he was suicidal.

Members also said a psychiatric assessment would have helped determine Mrs. A’s MAID eligibility. If she had declined, the MAID practitioner would have had to say that her eligibility could not be determined.

The Ontario’s ministry of the solicitor general told Gillmore:

MAID requests have become more complex since 2021 when the federal government removed the requirement that someone’s death be reasonably foreseeable to qualify for MAID.

“The interpretation of illness and function of decline are more challenging for MAID assessors and providers to evaluate,” the statement says.

The MDRC committee were divided MAiD for psychological reasons. Gillmore reports:

A few members of the committee said current MAID practices need to be re-evaluated.

They said clarity is needed about whether a person’s refusal of routine treatments or food and water qualifies them as being in an irreversible state of decline.

These members also said further guidance is needed about how to assess a decline in capability when a person’s disability means they always depend on others for some care.

Gillmore ended the article by stating:

There were 4,958 MAID deaths in Ontario in 2024; coroners’ investigations were started in 299 — or six per cent — of these cases, the office of the solicitor general said in its statement. Five investigations are ongoing.

Previous article: Canada euthanasia reports: Rushing to Death (Link).

How America abandoned its assisted suicide "safeguards"

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Alexander Raikin

Alexander Raikin wrote an excellent article: How America abandoned its suicide safeguards which explains how the US states that have legalized assisted suicide abandoned the "safeguards" in their assisted suicide laws. I have written several articles on this topic especially since nearly every assisted suicide law in America, once passed, was later expanded. Raikin explains:

In 2020, Jane, a 29-year-old Colorado woman with eating disorders, was “provided with lethal drugs … in the midst of a mental-health crisis”, according to a lawsuit filed this year by the Institute for Patients’ Rights, an advocacy group seeking to overturn Colorado’s assisted-suicide program. Jane qualified for assisted suicide, the lawsuit contends, yet she was discharged from a hospice because she no longer qualified for hospice care, and her hospice considered her no longer competent to consent to medical treatments. So how could she have consented to suicide-by-doctor?

Jane was fortunate: her parents successfully sued for guardianship, and a court ordered the medication to be destroyed. Jane “went on to recover from all of it, including her anorexia”, according to Matt Vallière, the executive director of the Institute for Patients’ Rights. Jane found work as an occupational therapist, went on vacation, and even purchased a home. Although she ultimately died two years later of complications from her history of eating disorders, she’d had an opportunity to “live her best life”, Vallière says. That any medical professional decided that Jane qualified for assisted suicide, he claims, was “absurd”.

Raikin states that Jane’s case isn’t unusual and violations of assisted-suicide laws are rampant with no known suspensions or revocations of clinician licenses, even when patients were endangered. Raikin explains how these laws are being violated:

Much of the issue is oversight. In each of the 11 states that have implemented suicide-by-doctor, regulations require clinicians to submit compliance forms, typically within days of a patient’s death. These forms document that the patient expressly consented to die through assisted suicide, and that the clinicians followed all necessary legal safeguards and eligibility criteria, including affirming that the patient is terminally ill and of sound mind.

Failure to submit this documentation isn’t just a statutory offense. Medical providers and pharmacists who fail to “make a good-faith effort to file required documentation in a complete and timely manner”, as Washington state law instructs, risk losing“immunity protection” for the criminal act of assisting someone’s suicide. Yet a Department of Health report found that physicians improperly reported compliance for a third of all assisted suicide deaths in the Evergreen State. Indeed, Washington is missing 515 compliance forms entirely for the period between 2009 to 2023, according to my calculations based on annual reports, and is also short of 293 “written request” documents that patients are required to sign attesting that they wish to die by suicide. In Colorado, my calculations find that almost 1,800 compliance forms have remained missing since 2017.

The actual number of assisted suicide deaths is unknown. Raikin writes:

States can’t answer the most basic question: how many physician-assisted suicides have been facilitated by clinicians in America? Across Colorado and California, state authorities have no record of the type of “aid-in-dying drugs” that were prescribed to more than 1,000 patients, according to my analysis of state reports, including the California End of Life Option Act 2024 Data Report. In Oregon, the health authority has records on 376 assisted suicides completed in 2024, but for another 178 cases in which medications were prescribed, authorities don’t know if the patient died by ingesting the drugs, or even died at all.

Washington State has decided to stop publishing the assisted suicide data.

In 2022, Washington state announced that its Department of Health is diverting “all available funding” for its assisted-suicide compliance-review program to “data entry of submitted forms”, due to lack of funding from the state. Data entry is commendable. But by law, the state is also required to “review” reporting compliance and issue an annual report. Instead, this summer, a pop-up appeared on the department’s website: “Important Note: Due to funding cuts, the Death with Dignity Program at the Department of Health is suspended. … A 2024 annual statistical report will not be released.”

Washington state’s decision surprised even assisted-suicide clinicians. Jessica Kaan, the medical director for End of Life Washington, an institution which facilitates assisted suicides in the state, warned on a forum for providers that “no one will even be monitoring or responding to emails or phone calls that come into the DOH [Department of Health] about the DWD [Dying With Dignity] program”. Kaan called it “a grim situation”. After this push back, the state announced that it will release the 2024 report after all — but it will be the last one ever to be released.

Raikin then explains that New Mexico does not publish an annual report, even though the assisted suicide law requires an annual report. States are also removing the "safeguards" in the law. Raikin explains:

This systematic disregard of safeguards is happening as the process is being fast-tracked: states are removing requirements that applicants reside in state; allowing less-credentialed providers, such as social workers, nurses, and physician associates,to perform assessments instead of psychiatrists and psychologists; and reducing minimum waiting periods. In Oregon, which waived waiting periods in 2020,clinicians have reported in Oregon’s annual Death with Dignity Act report that assisted suicides routinely occur on the same or next day the patient makes there quest. Since in some cases it takes up to five days for a patient to die from ingesting the death cocktail, it is possible that it will take a patient longer to die than to receive lethal prescriptions.

The proportion of vulnerable persons dying by assisted suicide has also increased. Raikin writes:

The proportion of deaths of vulnerable patients has also increased by magnitudes. In the first year of Washington state’s program, 16% of patients mentioned “the physical or emotional burden on family, friends, or caregivers” as a reason for their decision to die, and 2% were concerned about “the financial cost of treating or prolonging the patient’s terminal condition”. By 2023, according to the state’s reporting, the number concerned with “feeling like a burden” jumped to half of all assisted-suicide deaths, and a 10th were concerned about “financial implications of treatment”.

A similar trend is unfolding in Oregon. In 2009, the first year that the program was available, no patients told their assisted-suicide clinician that they were choosing to die because of financial concerns, and only 12% felt like a burden. By 2024, the state’s reporting revealed that it was 9% and 42% of all assisted suicide deaths, respectively. No other states even report this data. The “attending physician follow-up form” in California, which records patient concerns that contribute to the choice of “aid-in-dying”, doesn’t have “financial concerns” or “feeling like a burden” on its otherwise identical menu of options.

Compliance with the law from physicians and the government is lacking. Raikin interviewed Craig New who overseas the assisted suicide program in Oregon. Raikin reports:

Craig New, who told me on the telephone that he’s the sole employee of the Oregon Health Authority responsible for monitoring compliance reporting, says that “ultimately the things usually get resolved because we bug them until they finally send in the paperwork”,but even so, his office has reported around a dozen physicians to the Oregon Medical Board for violations of compliance reporting. Thanks to privacy laws regarding medical licensing, it is impossible to know whether the reported physicians faced repercussions, but my review of the Oregon Medical Board’s investigations reveals that few offenses are prosecuted.

Raikin reports that Dr Rose Jeanine Kenny, in Oregon, was reprimanded by the Oregon Medical Board for contravening the assisted suicide law:

One example is Rose Jeannine Kenny, a family doctor, who in 2016 was sentenced to five years probation by the Oregon Medical Board for dozens of alleged prescription violations. Later the board received “credible information” that Kenny may have again violated the same provisions she was previously reprimanded for, and may possibly have committed “violations of the Oregon Death with Dignity Act”, such as failure to ensure consent, follow the rules of written and oral assisted suicide requests, abide by the minimum waiting period, and file compliance records. Kenny once again kept her license, this time by agreeing to “participate in all physician steps” for 10 more assisted suicides, supervised by a mentoring physician from Compassion & Choices — the largest lobbying group for assisted suicide in the United States. (UnHerd was unable to reach Dr. Kenny at any of the medical practices with which she is associated online.)

Raikin states that no researchers or law enforcement are allowed to systematically review the assisted suicide records. He then tells the story of a person in Maryland with a eating distorder:

Recent court proceedings in Maryland eerily echo the lawsuit regarding Jane. Angela Guarda, the director of the Eating Disorders Program at Johns Hopkins Hospital, testified that she was contacted by an ex-patient of Jennifer Gaudiani, the physician who coined the term “terminal anorexia”, and who has prescribed assisted-suicide medication to at least one patient. The concept of terminal anorexia was meant to apply only to patients over age 30; for younger patients, Gaudiani stressed in a paper for the Journal of Eating Disorders that “every effort should be made to promote full recovery and continuation of life”.

The ex-patient reported that her assisted-suicide assessor told her “she would ‘make an exception’ for me and ‘allow’ me to die”. The patient reported feeling coerced. She eventually weaned herself off morphine and hospice drugs and, 18 months later, reports that she’s doing well, with a job, a group of friends and a new puppy.

Raikin ends the article by stating:

Patients like these, who need hope the most, are facing much more than their illnesses. They also confront an assisted-suicide regime that blatantly and routinely violates the legal safeguards that were meant to ensure their protection from a death they might not want.

Further articles on this topic:

• Assisted suicide lobby launches court case to force Colorado to permit suicide tourism (Link). 
• The push to legalize and extend assisted suicide in America (Link).
• Oregon 2024 assisted suicide report (Link). 
• Death by assisted suicide is not what you think it is (Link).  
• Assisted suicide laws, once passed will inevitably expand (Link). 
• New York assisted suicide bill is a "bait and switch" (Link). 
• Oregon bill would expand assisted suicide again (Link).
  

Cam: Disabled since birth, shares his zest for life

Cam MacDonald

Dear ...

I am sorry to hear about your recent car accident, how it has left you in pain and temporarily unable to do many of the things that you love. As someone who has dealt with a disability their whole life, I understand how frustrating things can be. I know how it feels to be isolated and left out.

I understand that frustration can often lead us to contemplate suicide (MAID) or self-harm, but I also know that if circumstances were different and things were going well, this would not be something that you would be considering. When I have contemplated suicide, the four areas of struggle for me have been faith, hope, peace and purpose. When I am in these situations, it is a struggle to think positively. Yet, in every situation, there are eventually good things waiting, just around the corner.

For myself, I was unable to play sports as a kid because of my disability. Those days sucked because I was unable to spend time with my friends, doing what we all loved.

However a few years later, when I was 10, I became aware of a swim club for disabled people. At that time I was pretty awful at swimming, I couldn’t even pass the fourth level of swimming lessons, (something some six year-olds could do.) Despite this fact, I began swimming two times a week with the swim team.

At the age of 13, I was given an opportunity to compete at the Canada Summer Games because there was an open spot on the team, for a disabled swimmer. This opportunity allowed me to practice almost every day that summer, culminating with me having the race of my life to shockingly capture a gold medal.

Two years later, in 2007, I was good enough to compete at the national championships and after an additional seven years of hard work, I finally got the opportunity to race for Team Canada on the international stage, where I won a bronze medal for our country.

In 12 years, I went from a 10-year-old kid who couldn’t play sports, to an international athlete. It is something that hardly anyone would have believed, but it happened.

The peak of my swimming career was extremely short, as sinus and chest infections started to pile up. I needed to find another endeavor to pursue. I had tried to find a job throughout the summer months during the last 2 years of my swimming career. This task was very difficult because I was a person with a disability who had limited work and volunteer experience.

After failing to obtain a job for 2 years, I figured that I needed to change my approach. I did a google search about particular organizations in my community that focused on causes that I was interested in. I then clicked on the first one, Life’s Vision. I sent Life’s Vision and email with an attached resume and I began working with them 3 months later. I was originally supposed to work 6-10 hours each week for them, but by the end of the summer, I was working 24 hours per week.

After that summer, I continued working with the organization as part of my university practicum. I graduated university that spring and was hired by the organization as an Executive Assistant.

In my 4.5 years with Life’s Vision, I was able to work my way from the bottom of the organization to the very top, serving in both the Interim Executive Director and Co Director roles.

Both professionally and athletically, my story has followed a similar arch. It has been a roller coaster of ups and downs, trying to find an environment in which I can succeed.

I know that we cannot control all of our circumstances as people with disabilities, but I do know that you are designed to serve a special purpose on this Earth. I am of the conviction that you can make a huge difference in this world, no matter how awful you feel in this moment.

Over the years I have come to realize that I don’t have to have the ability to do everything myself in order to make a difference; I can’t walk, I can’t write, I can’t drive and I can’t do things as efficiently as others. Despite these facts, I still strive to make a difference because even though I can’t do all of those things, I still have ears that can listen, a mouth that can encourage and a mind with knowledge that can be used to make the world a better place.

It is easy to focus on the things that we can’t do because they tend to be the barriers that we become frustrated with. However, it is important to think about how we can leverage our circumstances for good. Can you write a book to inspire others? Can you call lonely people and talk to them? Can you be an advocate for people who are in similar situations to the one that you are in?

I know that you have the ability to do great things and your disability may even provide you with a unique path forward to make that happen. By continuing to fight, you will be able to tell a great story.

We are all uniquely created and have a special purpose in life. Sadly, we often don’t know what our purpose is and we often can’t see the great things that are waiting at the end of the tunnel.

I would love to get to know you, maybe I have experience that could help you when it comes to facing the obstacles that are in front of you right now, if I don’t, I am here to listen to you, pray with you and help you however I can!

There is a purpose for you and I am here to journey with you!

Peace be with you,

Cam MacDonald

Lesson in Disability Justice 2: Opposition to Recent/Proposed Disability Policy Changes Is Not “Hysteria”

Meghan Schrader

By Meghan Schrader

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

I was asked to write blogs for the EPC concerning the “MAiD” movement's undermining of disabled people’s human rights. However, “MAiD” is not the only practice with a corrosive impact on disabled people’s lives. 

Therefore, as a disability justice advocate in the anti assisted suicide movement, I think it’s important for euthanasia opponents to know that in the past year there have been several proposed and/or implemented policy changes that dismantle or weaken disability rights laws in the United States.

These policy changes are opposed by pretty much everyone I know in the disability justice community; including groups and advocates who make opposing assisted suicide part of their mission. I am going to go into more detail about what most of those policies are and why they are harmful in a subsequent blog post, but what I wish to focus on in this post is the proposition that I’ve heard from some assisted suicide opponents, who do sincerely support disability justice in general, that the disability rights groups warning about the impact of these changes are getting misinformation from biased news sources and engaging in “woke politics” and “hysteria.”

Meh. 

The disability justice model would oppose these policies no matter what political party wanted to implement them. I urge assisted suicide opponents not to reflexively dismiss concepts like “systemic,” “ableism” and “systemic ableism” as “hysteria” just because those ideas are being articulated by those who embrace other ideologies that you strongly oppose. I’ve lived with disabilities all my life. I grew up in America’s dysfunctional Special Education system, where I experienced social policies that empowered prejudiced people to push disabled people towards choices that have a corrosive impact on their futures. I have published research in the field of disability studies and have followed the disability justice movement’s activities for many years. So, although no ideology or source of information is infallible, I think it’s reasonable for me to trust information from other disability rights advocates more than information from sources and people who have spent significantly less time studying disability policy. 

I also think people from all over the ideological spectrum can agree that society has moral duties to people with disabilities. I see no reason why people of differing ideologies cannot, at times, put practicality first and work together to fulfill these responsibilities. 

I think assisted suicide opponents who want society to meet its obligations to disabled people need to understand that the disability justice groups opposing the aforementioned policy changes are staffed by lawyers, advocates and scholars who have fought for disability justice for decades. Those groups aren’t relying on information from social media or biased news sources. Their leaders are primarily people with disabilities who are reading the texts of these proposed policies and drawing their opposition from years of fighting for disability rights. 

I urge other assisted suicide opponents to recognize that fighting ableism requires comprehensive knowledge. Certainly there are many news sources with clear political biases of all kinds, but in this case the “biased news sources” are reporting what disability justice advocates have said, not the other way around. If groups like the ARC, the Association of University Centers on Disability, the Autistic Self Advocacy Network, the National Council on Disability, the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund, the United Spinal Association, the National Association of Councils on Developmental Disabilities, the American Association of People with Disabilities, the National Council on Independent Living and all of the people at the ADAPT Americans With Disabilities Act anniversary party I attended recently tell me that a trillion dollars have been cut from Medicaid and that this will restrict home and community based services for people with disabilities, I trust them more than I trust President Trump’s website. The aforementioned groups/individuals have fought for disability rights for decades and President Trump has not.

Opposition to these new policies does not mean that disability justice advocates are not grateful for the rights that disabled Americans have. As a disabled American I am very thankful that the Americans with Disabilities Act gives disabled Americans more rights than disabled people have in other parts of the world; the law has served as the model for the United Nations Convention On The Rights Of People With Disabilities. But, despite the ADA and similar laws, Americans with disabilities face discrimination every day. Although not everyone who supports an ableist policy is a bad person, assuming the competency or positive intentions of whoever happens to embrace your preferred political party or ideology is not realistic. The disability justice movement’s opposition to various policies might seem like “hysteria”  to some people, but that is generally because so many disabled people and our allies have been put in situations where safeguarding disability rights seems to require one to become, well, “hysterical.” 

Despite how blunt I can be on this blog or on X, I am, somewhere in my heart, still a “people pleaser;” I like being kind to others. So, when I self-advocate for accommodations for my Nonverbal Learning Disability and bipolar disorder, I try to be a nice, reasonable person. But I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thoroughly explained why I need an accommodation very nicely and politely and still found myself in situations that compromised my dignity; ones where I didn’t have much energy to devote to being “nice;” or it seemed that being “nice” needed to be of secondary concern, such as confrontations, acrimonious meetings and even “hysterical” screaming matches with virulently ableist people who had power over me and other people with disabilities. Every day disabled people interact with people who sneer at our efforts to get an education or a job; people who think disabled people are inherently violent, people who assume that people with disabilities are lying about our impairments, people who aggressively manipulate loopholes in disability rights laws and people who angrily complain about even the trivialist effort to accommodate someone’s disability. That is why so many disability justice advocates oppose “MAiD”: Disability justice advocates know how difficult it is for individuals to resist the impacts of ableist policies, so that movement largely recognizes “MAiD” as creating new situations in which disabled people are bullied into dying. 

I encourage “MAiD” opponents to recognize that deep history and common personal experiences have given disability justice advocates insight into the impact of disability rights laws. Disability justice advocates have every justification to oppose things like subminimum wages, the recent Medicaid cuts, dismantling the Department of Education, proposed changes to IDEA, cutting Special Education funding, and cutting funding for postsecondary structures that serve people with disabilities. Disability rights advocates have every reason to oppose the Section 504 lawsuit’s efforts to vitiate the entire Final Rule.  It is wholly reasonable for disability justice advocates to resist laws that reverse the disability justice movement’s progress in stopping arbitrary institutional confinement of disabled individuals. It is perfectly logical for disability justice advocates to oppose the proposed recision of portions of Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act that incentivize employers to hire people with disabilities. It is wise for disability rights advocates to oppose repealing portions of Section 503 that outline how employers must comply with fundamental portions of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Disabled people and our allies are perfectly justified in assuming that the Department of Energy’s attempt to loosen rules requiring that new construction be accessible to people with disabilities will not turn out well. 

In short, the disability justice movement’s suspicion about assisted suicide is equally valid when applied to other policies. I think that even if not all of the anticipated consequences of these policies come to fruition, that will be primarily because of the disability justice movement’s efforts to mitigate those harms. 

I have been asked to remember that not everyone who supports the aforementioned policy changes is “evil.” I don’t think all supporters of these policies are evil, just like I don’t think that everyone who supports “MAiD” is evil. But, just “not being evil” is  not enough for disabled people to be treated as equals. It is not realistic to expect every assisted suicide opponent to agree with every disability rights group or advocate on every nuance of every issue, but the things disability justice advocates want for disabled people: jobs that pay at least minimum wage, access to new construction, a good education, a strong social support system, home and community based services, etc-are generally policies that everyone on the political spectrum can agree about. Those policies benefit disabled people regardless of what other social group they belong to; they are not conjured from “hysteria.”

So, EPC blog readers, embrace your full potential as assisted suicide opponents. Listen carefully to the experiences and history of the disability justice advocates who work alongside you to oppose “MAiD.” If you want your anti euthanasia advocacy to flower into something really wonderful for people with disabilities, support disability rights policies that allow disabled people to flourish; ensure we experience equality and dignity in all domains of life. 

• Lesson in Disability Justice 1: Disability Justice Is a Whole Cloth Effort (Link).