Canada's allows people who are not dying to be killed by euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg

Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Canada's euthanasia law allows people to be killed by euthanasia:

• Even when they do not have a terminal condition, 
• If they have a terminal condition they can be approved and killed on the same day, 
• It permits euthanasia for people who have a treatable condition but are refusing treatment,
• It permits people who are motivated to die, based on a mental illness (disorder) if they have another medical condition,
• It permits euthanasia of people who are incompetent, if the person had previously been approved to be killed by euthanasia.
• and more.

At a recent presentation, a woman challenged the information that was provided. She insisted that "she had done her research" and that MAiD (euthanasia) was only being done to people with terminal illnesses, that there is a 10-day waiting period, and that euthanasia was prohibited for people with mental illnesses.

She insisted that the facts were being exaggerated.

EPC opposes all euthanasia and assisted suicide. We oppose killing people. But my response to this person is - "I wish you were right."

If euthanasia were limited to terminally ill people, or if there was still a 10-day waiting period or if mental health concerns prevented a person from being killed by euthanasia, at least there would be fewer deaths.

Canadian euthanasia facts.

The Supreme Court of Canada ordered Canada's parliament to legalize a limited form of euthanasia and assisted suicide in the Carter decision (2015). The Carter decision was an activist decision that used imprecise language to allow medical professionals in Canada to kill people. At that time I stated:

Will abuse of the law occur? How could it not? The Supreme Court states that the person must have “a grievous and irremediable medical condition (including an illness, disease or disability).” This is an incredibly subjective statement. Many people have a grievous and irremediable medical condition. Indeed, under this definition people with a significant disability may now feel pressured, by friends or the medical system to "choose" euthanasia.

Sometimes I wish that I was wrong. In this case history has proved me to be right.

Bill C-14 became law on June 17, 2016 legalizing euthanasia and assisted suicide. Bill C-14 created an exception in the Criminal Code for medical and nurse practitioners. The original euthanasia law, more accurately described as medical homicide, permitted physicians and nurse practitioners to kill a person, if the person was competent adult who was capable of consenting, who asked to be killed, was over the age of 18 and "suffering" in a manner that the person found to be unacceptable and their natural death was reasonably foreseeable. The law did not define the phrase "natural death is reasonably foreseeable". Bill C-14 did include a 10-day waiting period but the doctor or nurse practitioner could waive the 10-day waiting period

In June 2016 I was very concerned about the fact that Bill C-14 provided full legal immunity to physicians and nurse practitioners who participate in euthanasia. There was and is no possible way to prosecute a doctor, even in the most egregious circumstances.

Soon after legalization there were court cases launched, the first in British Columbia and the second one in Québec to challenge the requirement that a person's natural death must be reasonably foreseeable.

In September 2019, during the federal election, The Quebec Superior Court Justice Christine Baudouin struck down the requirement that a person be terminally ill before they qualify for euthanasia in Canada in the Truchon decision. The federal and Québec governments did not appeal the Truchon lower court decision therefore enabling the decision to become a precedent in Québec.

It must be noted that Justice Baudouin who promulgated the Truchon decision, should have recused herself from the case since she was intimitely connected to the euthanasia lobby. Remember, Truchon is a Québec lower court decision and is technically only a precedent in Québec.

The Truchon decision led to the federal government passing Bill C-7 on March 17, 2021. Bill C-7 went beyond the requirements set-out in the Truchon decision in several ways.

1. Bill C-7 removed the requirement in the law that a person’s natural death be reasonably foreseeable to qualify for euthanasia enabling people who are not terminally ill to be killed by euthanasia. The Truchon decision only required this amendment to the law.
2. Bill C-7 permitted a doctor or nurse practitioner to lethally inject a person who is incapable of consenting, if that person was previously approved for euthanasia. This contravened the Supreme Court of Canada Carter decision which 
3. Bill C-7 removed the ten-day waiting period when a person's natural death is deemed to be reasonably foreseeable enabling a person to die a same day euthanasia death on a "bad day."
4. Bill C-7 created a two track law. A person whose natural death is deemed to be reasonably foreseeable has no waiting period while a person whose natural death is not deemed to be reasonably foreseeable has a 90 day waiting period before being killed by lethal injection.
5. Bill C-7 (originally) falsely claimed to prevent euthanasia for people with mental illness. After Canada's Senate demanded that euthanasia for mental illness be added to the law, parliament specifically approved euthanasia for mental illness but added a two-year moratorium (March 17, 2023) to enable parliament to create "rules" concerning euthanasia for mental illness as a sole criteria.

Later, euthanasia for mental illness, as a sole criteria, was delayed by parliament until March 17, 2024 and then it was delayed again until March 17, 2027.

Euthanasia based on mental illness is happening in Canada, but the law requires that the person must also have another medical condition.

Bill C-7 went much further than the Quebec Superior Court Truchon decision and now that parliament has approved euthanasia for mental illness alone, Bill C-7 is much worse.

Parliament introduced Bill C-41 on October 27, 2026 to prevent euthanasia based on mental illness as a sole criteria but it also approves euthanasia based on advance request.