Should the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition apologize to Helen Long from Dying with Dignity?

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

On May 5, I had the opportunity to present to the Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying (AMAD). The AMAD committee is examining whether Canada was "ready" to begin euthanasia (MAiD) for mental illness alone, which is currently scheduled to begin on March 17, 2027.

My presentation time was shared with Helen Long, the CEO of Dying with Dignity, Canada's leading euthanasia lobby group and Alicia Duncan, the daughter of Donna Duncan, who died by euthanasia after experiencing a head injury from a car accident.

My presentation focused on Canada needing to conduct a complete review of it's euthanasia law which was required in the original legislation but has never been done. All of the reviews of Canada's euthanasia law were limited to examining further expansions of the law.

On May 4, the day before the AMAD committee hearing, Dying With Dignity filed an emergency relief in an Ontario court, urging the court to legislate from the bench and order the killing of Claire Elyse Brosseau who is living with mental illness as her sole underlying condition. The Dying with Dignity press release, explains that Brosseau, Dying With Dignity and Dr Patricia Smith filed the case.

During the question and answer session at the AMAD committee Helen Long claimed to represent the people who were demanding euthanasia for the sole underlying condition of mental illness. She then read a letter from Claire Brosseau whereby Brosseau complains that the AMAD committee did not bring witnesses from people who are seeking euthanasia, based on mental illness alone.

In concluding the Brosseau's letter, Long read: 

“We so often hear the expression ‘Nothing About Us Without Us’ and yet they have refused to hear from any people who are harmed from the exclusion…”

Amy Hasbrouck

Amy Hasbrouck, the director of Toujours Vivant - Not Dead Yet and a past-President of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition responded to the use of the axiom "Nothing about us without us" with an article that essentially tells the euthanasia lobby to: Get our words out of your mouth.

Hasbrouck challenges Long and the euthanasia lobby based on the fact that people with disabilities experience the ultimate discrimination through euthanasia laws, that being death. Hasbrouck explains the long-standing opposition to euthanasia and assisted suicide by the disability community and completes her article by stating:

When people’s livelihood and self-image depends on not understanding something, they probably won’t understand it. Apparently, Ms. Long’s personal, pecuniary and political interests depend on her not knowing that it is very uncool to appropriate a disability rights principle in advocating a position the disability rights movement strongly opposes.

Since then the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and Amy Hasbrouck have been lobbied by euthanasia lobbyists, Claire Brosseau and her family to apologize to Helen Long.

John Brosseau sent the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and Amy Hasbrouck this message:

I find myself compelled to respond to the words you published about Helen Long. 

Helen Long has sustained my daughter through circumstances of profound and unrelenting difficulty. She has offered her support with a constancy and grace that few possess. There is no ambiguity about her character or her commitment to Claire. You were cognizant of the fact that Helen spoke on my daughter’s behalf. You possessed this knowledge. You chose to publish your critique nonetheless, directing it at a woman whose sole purpose has been to advocate for my daughter’s dignity and her right to self-determination.

Claire Brosseau sent us a message, urging us to apologize to Helen Long.

So what did Amy Hasbrouck write that requires an apology? 

Hasbrouck, who practised law in Massachusetts, stated that she is a survivor of childhood trauma, she has lived with mental illness and she has been a long-time disability rights activist. Among other things, Hasbrouck wrote:

If she (Helen Long) knew the first thing about ableism, Ms. Long would know that MAiD discriminates against disabled people by definition; disability is among the eligibility criteria enumerated in the definition of a grievous and irremediable medical condition. She would also know that MAiD was provided to many non-terminal disabled people even before the 2019 Truchon decision and the 2021 adoption of Bill C-7, which created “track 2” eligibility for people whose deaths were not “reasonably foreseeable.” Even if Ms. Long didn’t have the advantage of the lived experience of disability discrimination to guide her in evaluating Bill C-14, and its early implementation, anyone who claimed the solidarity of “nothing about us, without us” should have noticed what’s happened in the ten years since legalization; the failure to improve access to palliative care, the reports of same-day euthanasia and MAiD requests linked to “external pressure” (poverty, inadequate and inaccessible housing, and treatment denials) the 100,000 euthanasia deaths and the transformation of an “exceptional” measure to an “expected” response.

Hasbrouck was angry about the use of the disability axiom, "Nothing about us without us" to promote euthanasia, especially since euthanasia was legalized in Canada without considering the concerns of the disability community. Considering her experience and Canada's reality I consider Hasbrouck's anger to be in it's proper place.

As for Brosseau, she is being used by the euthanasia lobby for the purpose of expanding euthanasia to people with mental illness. If she wants to be used by the euthanasia lobby, then that's her decision, but if she is granted death by the court, based on mental illness as the sole criteria, many more people will also be killed based on that precedent. Killing results in many more people being killed.

I oppose killing people and I support the best possible care being provided. But death is never a solution even when it becomes the final solution.

But if I am wrong and if the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition should apologize to Helen Long for publishing Amy's article, then let the readers tell us. Otherwise I will continue to support Amy Hasbrouck and the disability community.