Woman sought death by euthanasia. She lost her ability to cook.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The New York Times on October 5, 2026 published an article titled: Assisted Death is not a choice of last resort in Canada by Dr Gary Rodin and Dr Madeline Li, who are professors of psychiatry at the University of Toronto.

 
The article explained that both of them work with patients with advanced cancer and have counselled and assessed patients for euthanasia and one of them has administered the drugs (poison) to end a persons life.

Dr's Madeline Li & Gary Rodin

Rodin and Li provided information about cases where the patient, through counselling, changed their mind or delayed being killed. The first story was a woman in her 70's who sought death based on losing her ability to cook:

We’ve seen how beneficial it is to pause and reflect with our own patients. One of them, a woman in her 70s, was the matriarch of her family, the one who made Sunday dinners. She sought and received approval for assisted dying after she lost the ability to cook. She felt she had lost her value to her family. Through counselling, she came to understand that her family valued who she was, not what she did for them. She decided not to go through with ending her life, at least for now. That Christmas, her family gathered and she sat proudly at the table, while others did the cooking and serving.

The woman was approved for euthanasia, based on her medical condition, but she was seeking death based on losing her ability to cook. The authors show how this woman found personal meaning in caring for her family and through counselling she was assured that she continued to have meaning for her family.

The next story was less uplifting, even though it showed counselling enabled this man to delay being killed. 

Another patient, a man in his 80s, refused a new treatment that might extend his life and instead requested and was approved for assisted dying. He survived the Holocaust as a child and viewed the freedom to choose the timing of his own death as a way of reclaiming what Hitler had taken away from his parents. However, his living family’s grief mattered to him, too, and they had concerns about him giving up too soon. With counselling, he chose to delay. Months later, he had adapted to his illness and continued to find meaning in his life. Eventually he got sicker and Dr. Li told him he was at risk of losing capacity to consent to assisted dying. This time, he chose the procedure, fully supported and surrounded by his family.

With the second story, Dr. Li suggests that his time to be killed had come. I understand that his medical condition had progressed, but the answer to human difficulty should never be medical homicide. 

This man could have had a fulfilling final months of life as he approached natural death. Counselling is a good response, but caring not killing, provides hope.

Dr Madeline Li

Dr Madeline Li was featured in the article by Elaina Plott Calabro, who wrote an exposé on Canada's euthanasia law that was published in the September 2025 edition of the Atlantic titled - Canada is Killing Itself.

Calabro interviews Madeline Li, an early euthanasia pioneer who had developed the euthanasia program at the University Health Network in Toronto in 2017. In 2018 Li started questioning the euthanasia program.

It was not long into her practice, however, that Li’s confidence in the direction of her country’s MAID program began to falter. For all of her expertise, not even Li was sure what to do about a patient in his 30s whom she encountered in 2018.

The man had gone to the emergency room complaining of excruciating pain and was eventually diagnosed with cancer. The prognosis was good, a surgeon assured him, with a 65 percent chance of a cure. But the man said he didn’t want treatment; he wanted MAID. Startled, the surgeon referred him to a medical oncologist to discuss chemo; perhaps the man just didn’t want surgery. The patient proceeded to tell the medical oncologist that he didn’t want treatment of any kind; he wanted MAID. He said the same thing to a radiation oncologist, a palliative-care physician, and a psychiatrist, before finally complaining to the patient-relations department that the hospital was barring his access to MAID. Li arranged to meet with him.

Li explained that the prevailing view was that a medical condition was considered incurable if it could not be cured by means acceptable to the patient.

In other words, the law is completely subjective. Someone who has a treatable condition can be killed by euthanasia. Li told Calabro that she agreed with this. Calabro continued:

This had made sense to Li. If an elderly woman with chronic myelogenous leukemia had no wish to endure a highly toxic course of chemo and radiation, why should she be compelled to? But here was a young man with a likely curable cancer who nevertheless was adamant about dying.

What was Li left with? According to prevailing standards, the man’s refusal to attempt treatment rendered his disease incurable and his natural death was reasonably foreseeable. He met the eligibility criteria as Li understood them. But the whole thing seemed wrong to her. Seeking advice, she described the basics of the case in a private email group for MAID practitioners under the heading “Eligible, but Reasonable?” “And what was very clear to me from the replies I got,” Li told me, “is that many people have no ethical or clinical qualms about this—that it’s all about a patient’s autonomy, and if a patient wants this, it’s not up to us to judge. We should provide.”

In the end, Li killed this man but she regretted it. This is the crux of the issue. Euthanasia is sold as choice and autonomy, but it requires another person to do the killing.

Rodin and Li are suggesting that a medical "pause" in euthanasia, through counselling, gives patients a chance to discover alternatives or to establish that their life has meaning. 

I agree with their premise but I find it to be counter intuitive if it still leads to killing.

Bill C-218 was defeated. Your advocacy made a difference.

This message was received from Tamara Jansen (MP) thanking people who advocated in support of Bill C-218. Your advocacy made a difference.

If you saw last week’s headlines, you may have thought Canadians struggling with mental illness were finally protected from MAiD.

I wish I could tell you that protection was now law.

On the morning of the vote on Bill C-218, the Liberals announced that they would introduce their own legislation to stop MAiD for people whose only underlying medical condition is a mental illness. But their announcement came with a deeply troubling condition: they intend to expand MAiD at the same time.

Canada already has one of the most permissive assisted-dying systems in the world. Serious concerns about safeguards remain, while Canadians struggle to access mental health treatment, disability supports and timely medical care.

Why is the government planning another expansion when so many people cannot get the care they need? 

Bill C-218 offered Parliament a focused way to protect Canadians struggling with mental illness. Instead of sending it to committee for study, the Liberals voted it down in favour of a promised bill Parliament has not yet seen. 

The March 17, 2027 deadline remains. Unless new legislation passes before then, MAiD will become legal for people whose only underlying medical condition is a mental illness.

By tying that urgently needed protection to a further expansion of MAiD, the Liberals are forcing Parliament to accept another expansion with little time for scrutiny and debate, or risk leaving vulnerable Canadians unprotected. 

I am deeply disappointed that C-218 was defeated. It was exactly the sort of bill that could have saved lives.

But I want you to know that your efforts mattered. Your letters, calls, prayers and conversations helped put pressure on the government to commit to stopping that expansion.

Now we must hold them to that commitment. Canadians should not have to accept a further expansion of MAiD to secure protection for people struggling with mental illness. 

I will keep pressing for that protection to become law before the deadline to ensure Canadians are offered treatment, support and the opportunity to recover.

👉 Watch my response following the vote:
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1KZfwBUgvT/ 

👉 Watch my press conference:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fuWS1pz_ec

 

Thank you for standing with me. We have more work to do, and I remain determined to defend the right to recover.

With gratitude,

MP Tamara Jansen
Cloverdale—Langley City

Free online film screening of Prescription Poison on October 27.

Register for the free online screening of the Prescription Poison film: Averting Assisted Suicide in America 

Tuesday, October 27 at: 8 pm (Eastern Time) / 5 pm (Pacific Time).

The Prescription Poison film is produced by Alex Schadenberg, Executive Director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and Frank Panico with Xs in the Sky films.  

Topic: Prescription Poison - Averting Assisted Suicide in America

Thursday Aug 27, 2026 2 PM Eastern Time/11 am Pacific Time. 

Register in advance for the screening: (Registration Link). 

Prescription Poison is 43 minutes and will be followed by a discussion.

Prescription Poison is ground-breaking documentary exposing the expansion of assisted suicide in America.

The film seeks to awaken America to the growth of assisted suicide and warns Americans that, unless stopped, the Canadian system of killing will become a reality in America.

Purchase the Prescription Poison film for $10 US (download) or $15 DVD at: Prescriptionpoison.com

Watch the Prescription Poison Trailer:

Topic: Prescription Poison - Averting Assisted Suicide in America.

Tuesday, October 27, 2026 8 pm Eastern Time/5 pm Pacific Time.

Register in advance for the screening: (Registration Link). 

Three Strikes and You're Dead.

This article was published by Amy Hasbrouck on her substack on October 14, 2026.

Euthanasia via advance request for people with dementia

Amy Hasbrouck

By Amy Hasbrouck, a disability rights activist,
Past President: Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Liberal government defeated the private members bill that would have prohibited MAiD for people whose requests were based only on a “mental disorder,” (either because it was sponsored by a conservative, or they didn’t want to bother amending the language) even as it announced a policy that would achieve the same end. This was just the latest in the Liberals’ highly (un)democratic moves undertaken with regard to state-sponsored killing of ill and disabled people.

At the same press conference, the Carney administration announced that while people with mental illness will be protected against the coercive effects of the MAiD regime, people with dementia will be thrown under the bus. Because the same prejudice that drives stigma and discrimination against people with a psychiatric disability applies equally (albeit with a slightly different flavour) to people with dementia; “You’d have to be out of your mind to want to live like that.” Euthanasia via advance request creates a motor coach sized loophole for abuse.

Under advance requests, people with dementia have three strikes against them.

The first strike occurs when the person receives a dementia diagnosis. People who have lived as non-disabled who receive any kind of disability diagnosis often face a revelation similar to opening a “Pandora’s box” of frightening ideas about what their life will look like in the future. Such ideas are based on prejudice and stereotypes, starting with children’s fairy tales, developing through movies and TV, then gaining momentum and toxicity on the internet and social media. A person facing a dementia diagnosis will hear dire predictions about loss of dignity and personhood, and be treated to sordid tales of elder abuse or failures of the inadequate, inappropriate and disempowering elder-care infrastructure.  

The second strike comes when the person making the advance request, in the aftermath of a shocking diagnosis and in the face of acute disability discrimination and doomsaying, must designate a decision-maker, and describe the conditions that will trigger their demise. The person probably won’t receive much balanced information to counteract the above-mentioned negative stereotypes and horror stories, nor are they likely to hear about the positive aspects of living with dementia, such as:

• The potential for creativity – Art, painting, music and crafting – given time and lack of inhibition. Creative activities require less memory or language, and allow for emotional expression.
• Connection through music: The areas of the brain that process and remember music are often preserved longer. Familiar songs can trigger joy, comfort, and active engagement even with profound memory loss.
• Lowered self-expectation and fewer demands can encourage experimentation and free up energy for hobbies and creative pursuits.
• Jokes and humour can be recycled. Favourite movies or TV shows are new again.
• Living in the Moment: Many people are more able to focus on the present, appreciating sensory pleasures—such as a warm cup of tea, a pet, or a walk outside—without the burden of past regrets or future anxieties.
• Reframing Priorities:
• A diagnosis often prompts people to let go of trivial stressors, slow down, and focus on what brings happiness and connection.
• Advocacy and Purpose: Some people with early-stage dementia find renewed identity and purpose in public speaking, writing (such as poetry or memoirs), and advocacy to challenge social stigmas.
• Strengthened Relationships: Shifting the focus away from traditional ideas of “success” to emotional presence can foster deeper, more authentic bonds between partners, family members, and caregivers.
• Incentive for Wellness: Adopting lifestyle changes—such as regular physical exercise, balanced nutrition, social activities, and cognitive stimulation—can improve overall physical health, mood, and mental clarity.
• Preserving Independence: Utilizing daily routines, assistive technology and devices, visual reminders, and self-directed supports helps maintain autonomy, dignity, and a sense of being useful, valued, engaged and in control.

However most general practitioners are not familiar with geriatric rehabilitation and independent living supports. More typically, the “triggering” conditions are listed as a litany of losses that are presented as undignified and intolerable, such as forgetting the names of one’s spouse or children, losing bladder and/or bowel control, being unable to prepare meals or needing help to eat; despite the fact that everyone lives with these realities during the course of their lives.  

The third strike happens months or years later, when the designated person decides that the conditions for death have been met. This assumes, of course, that the designee is still alive, available, not alienated, won’t benefit from the person’s demise, and has not burned out from unsupported caregiving, and so can make a deliberate and unbiased determination.

Even if the person has adapted to their disabilities, and has made peace with their dementia, any sign of dissatisfaction – passing frustration, or even just having a bad day – will likely be taken as indicating that they have reached the end of their rope, and want to “get it over with.” Disinterest in, or ambivalence about pursuing euthanasia may be deemed as demonstrating incompetence, since the person is expressing a different view to that stated when they were “competent.”

The euthanasia process having been set in motion, any further expressions or gestures of disagreement or resistance will be interpreted not as a desire to live, but either as desperation to have the process finished, or simply as evidence of incompetence. Such behaviour may be met with deception (clandestine administration of sedatives) and even physical force, in order to honour the person’s wish to avoid a “dehumanizing and undignified death.”

Strike three. You’re dead.

Death doctor promotes euthanasia for mental illness.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Jean Marmoreo, who is a family physician who practised in downtown Toronto for 45 years and became one of Canada’s first euthanasia doctors in 2016, wrote an opinion article that was published in the Globe and Mail on October 9, 2026 supporting euthanasia for mental illness, as a sole criteria.

Marmoreo's article fits the general position of the death lobby who have "drank the kool-aid" and view killing people by poison as just another procedure. Marmoreo states:

I was among the first physicians in this country to provide medical assistance in dying when it became legal in 2016. For more than 10 years, I have helped people die with the dignity this country promised them. So I am firm in saying that when Ottawa this week said it planned to bar those whose sole underlying condition is a mental disorder from requesting an assisted death, it wasn’t prudence dressed up as caution; it was politically driven cowardice in the face of controversy surrounding an individual’s Charter rights of bodily autonomy.

Marmoreo writes what the death lobby always write, that is to refer to the law as preventing someone from "requesting an assisted death" rather than stating the truth, that the law is preventing a doctor from killing a person, when their only condition is a mental disorder.

The euthanasia lobby writers use this tactic to change the issue to "freedom of speech" (request) rather than the doctor having the right to kill, which is more controversial.

Marmoreo then refers to killing people, whose sole underlying condition is a mental disorder, as being a "Charter" issue. This statement assumes that the Supreme Court of Canada, in Carter, decided that people have the right to be killed, even if their only condition is a mental disorder.

Marmoreo also follows the euthanasia lobby talking point, that killing people whose sole underlying condition is a mental disorder will prevent suicide. Marmoreo writes:

I have known too many patients who deteriorated and ended their own lives alone, without safeguards, without support, without the humane and legally supervised option that a person with a physical diagnosis would have been granted without a second thought. Canadians don’t keep statistics on “botched suicides,” but we should.

Suicide is always a tragedy and I understand that the Supreme Court of Canada, in Carter, falsely decided that legalizing assisted death will enable people to live longer because they would not "need" to die by suicide if medical homicide is an option.

The concept that medical homicide is better than self-killing assumes that a homicide is somehow less concerning than a suicide.

Finally Marmoreo goes on about how doctors are careful when they kill patients by lethal poison:

I have watched hundreds of good deaths, enough to know that one delivered at the patient’s request, after careful and rigorous assessment, is not an act of harm, but of mercy. 

Even if it would only result in "one" death delivered at the "patient's request" it would still constitute an act whereby a doctor or nurse practitioner kills a person based on a "irremediable" medical condition. Should doctors and nurse practitioners ever have the right to kill people?

Further to that, how can Marmoreo, who is not a psychiatrist, assume that the person who is killed actually had an irremediable medical condition? Leading psychiatrists across Canada have stated that it is impossible to determine if a person's mental disorder is irremediable. 

Treatment and care for people with suicidal ideation and mental health conditions is compassionate. Killing is not compassionate.

Letter to the Justice Minister concerning euthanasia by advanced request.

The following letter was sent by a supporter who wishes to remain anonymous.

Dear Hon Sean Fraser, Minister of Justice

I am writing to express my absolute condemnation of the government's plans to expand MAiD to permit advance requests for incapable, irreversible, and vulnerable patients. 

This trajectory is entirely unacceptable, represents severe human cruelty, and fundamentally violates the basic right of Canadians. 

Allowing doctor administrated death for individuals who cannot give immediate informed consent at the moment of administration removes final safeguards turning helpless individuals into victims of institutional failure. The expansion constitutes systemic ableism, projecting a cold-hearted societal evaluation that the lives of vulnerable or disabled people are not longer worth protecting.

Euthanasia and eugenics are not native to Canadian values, they trace their own origins to dark, destructive periods in European history importing these outdated practices is a regression toward state-sanctioned human sacrifice. The human body is naturally structured to navigate life and death on its own. The government does not own the health or bodies of its citizens, and nature must be allowed to take its course without bureaucratic or medical violence. 

The pseudoscience and historical medical overreach underlying these policies represent a complete failure of guidance. Instead of solving health and social challenges with genuine care, the state is facilitating, the termination of innocent civilians, rather than treating end of vulnerabilities as an inconvenience to be eliminated. Canada must redirect the resources. 

I urgently demand immediate attention your office to halt all legislation regarding requests, fully defund the maid framework, and work toward its absolute abolition. True governance require finding ethical ways to reverse medical conditions and support the helpless, not ending their lives, I will not vote for or support a destructive government that fails in the primary duty to protect its citizens. I respect a direct response outlining what immediate action your office will take to protect vulnerable Canadians and reverse the course.

Québec's Premier, who legalized euthanasia, has second thoughts.

"I'm not sure that I would have again voted for that law with the extension that we have seen in the recent years." Philippe Couillard.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Philippe Couillard

Philippe Couillard, who was the Premier of Québec in 2014 when euthanasia was legalized, stated on a CBC radio program that he is not sure if he would support that law today.

Darren Major reported for CBC News on October 10 that:

The former Québec premier who oversaw passage of Canada's first-ever medically assisted dying law says he now feels conflicted after seeing how far the practice has progressed since then.

Québec legalized euthanasia in 2014, before the Supreme Court of Canada promulgated the Carter decision which struck down Canada's criminal code statutes protecting Canadians from euthanasia and assisted suicide.

Quebéc legalized euthanasia by defining it (killing) as healthcare. Canada's constitution recognizes the provinces as having jurisdiction over healthcare in Canada.

Major reported that Couillard as stating on CBC radio - The House that he sometimes questions his 2014 decision after seeing how euthanasia has expanded in Quebec and Canada since that first law was passed.

"It was clearly reserved for terminal or pre-terminal conditions with a defined, unfortunate road to the end of life. And this is not the case anymore," he told host Catherine Cullen.

"I'm not sure that I would have again voted for that law with the extension that we have seen in the recent years."

Couillard, a former neurosurgeon, emphasized that the intention of Québec's original law was to limit euthanasia to those who with a terminal illness. Major reported:

"I was warned about this by people opposing the law that told me, 'We see your motivation is good, but you will see, once you open the door you will not close it and it will open wider.' And this is what happened," he said.

I had lunch with Couillard in 2014. I explained that euthanasia, in other jurisdictions, such as the Netherlands, was constantly expanding and I stated that, based on the language of the bill, that euthanasia would inevitably expand in Québec.

Major reported further comments by Couillard which indicate his division on the issue.

The poor oversight and expansion of euthanasia began immediately in Quebec.

Amy Hasbrouck, who was the President of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, wrote a report in October 2017 based on the first full year report of euthanasia in Quebec (June 10, 2016 - June 27, 2017). The report indicated that there were 638 reported euthanasia deaths in Quebec during that time-frame.
 

Hasbrouck explained that the Quebec report indicated that 31 euthanasia deaths (5%) were not compliant with the law and in 19 euthanasia deaths, the committee could not decide if those deaths were compliant. 

In June 2023 Quebec passed Bill 11 amending the Québec euthanasia law in the following ways:

• creating an obligation for palliative care homes to offer euthanasia, 
• allowing euthanasia in cases of serious physical disability
• approving euthanasia by advance request.

The Canadian Press reported that Bill 11 "also allows Quebecers to receive euthanasia in places other than hospitals, such as funeral homes and long-term care facilities."

The passage of Bill 11 in June 2023 forced all medical institutions, even those that were religiously affiliated, to provide euthanasia, it extended euthanasia to people with disabilities who are not terminally ill and it enabled pre-requests for euthanasia, thus eliminating the requirement that a person be competent.

The 2024–2025 Report of the Commission on End-of-Life Care on the Québec euthanasia data (April 1, 2024 to March 31, 2025) and the most recent data from Québec, indicated that there were 6,268 reported euthanasia deaths in that time-frame representing (7.9%) of all deaths, which was the highest rate in the world.

There were almost a 10 times the number of euthanasia deaths from the first full year of the law until (March 2025).

Based on the language of the euthanasia law, the legal expansions of the law and the normalization of euthanasia, one should not be surprised that euthanasia killings are "out of control" in Quebec.

Belgium Expands Killable Caste. Euthanasia Deaths Increase

This article was published by the National Review online on October 12, 2026.

Article: Almost 25% of Belgians who are killed by euthanasia are not terminally ill (Link).

Wesley Smith

By Wesley J Smith

I still marvel at people who think–even after decades of experience with these laws–that legalizing assisted suicide or euthanasia will remain limited to the few for whom nothing else can be done medically to prevent suffering. Not only is it not true, but it is never intended by euthanasia enthusiasts to be so constrained. Indeed, wherever killing as an answer to suffering is legalized, the numbers so dispatched continually rise, the guidelines expand, and euthanasia or suicide as a means of death becomes societally normalized.

In Belgium, that pattern continues. The Belgian Federal Commission for the Control and Evaluation of Euthanasia just issued a press release about its published euthanasia statistics for 2024–2025. A few observations: 

• As I perused the statistics, I was struck by how bloodless and stiflingly bureaucratic this killing machine has become. What was it that the philosopher Hanna Arendt said about the banality of evil?
• In 2003, there were 259 euthanasia killings. By 2023, there were 3,423, and in 2025, a whopping 4,487, a 31 percent increase from 2023. There will be even more this year, only to be topped every year thereafter going forward. In fact, only during the year of Covid in 2020 did Belgium record fewer euthanasia killings from one year to the next.
• In 2024–2025, 75.8 percent of the killings were of patients whose deaths were “within the foreseeable future.” That’s not the same thing at all as terminally ill. The rest — 24.2 percent — of the deaths were of people who were not anywhere near a natural death.
• Two of the killings were for minors under age 18. Expect pediatric euthanasia to increase going forward. Once killing is redefined as a medical “treatment,” how do you deny it to children?
• Fifteen were by “advance request.” This means incompetent people were killed who could not consent legally to being euthanized at the times of their deaths, and probably could not change their minds about being dispatched either because they were not legally capable of making their own medical decisions.
• One hundred twenty-nine people with mental illnesses who were not otherwise ill were dispatched. That’s a little less than one every 3 days. Only 9 of these were killed by psychiatrists, meaning doctors who do not specialize in treating mental illnesses killed the rest.
• Patients (536) were even euthanized in palliative care units. Killing isn’t palliation properly understood, but then, euthanasia corrupts everything it touches.
• Thousands (2592) of patients were dispatched in hospitals during the two years of the report. Some of these were for the purpose of organ harvesting, but the number of such cases is not discussed.
• Most of the euthanasia killings (63.5 percent) were carried out by general practitioners. GPs may not know all of the treatment options for serious diseases that require specialized care. A startling 48.4 percent of the killing doctors had no specialized training in end-of-life care.
• Many more Belgians were probably killed by doctors than the report indicates since terminal sedations are not included in euthanasia statistics.
• No policy is perfectly carried out, yet zero doctors were reported to courts for abuses. They rarely are anywhere euthanasia and assisted suicide are allowed. And on the few occasions when doctors have been reported, medical associations objected loudly because such cases could have a chilling effect on doctors’ willingness to kill patients.

The same pattern is happening here too, albeit more slowly. But if things keep up the way they are, we will — like our close cultural cousins in Canada — embrace the culture of death with great enthusiasm.

We must demand real end of life care --not killing.

Gordon Friesen
President: Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Gordon Friesen

In the past weeks there has been much discussion of a particular Ontario case involving an elderly patient who deliberately chose a Palliative Care facility where medical homicide was allegedly not practiced, but where she was nevertheless subjected to several very aggressive proposals for euthanasia; where, under worsening circumstances she was actually told that no other relief was possible; where faced with outrage, from her supporting entourage, it was finally admitted that palliative sedation did, in fact, remain an option; but where such sedation was ordered, not at once, but only for a future date; and where the patient died a natural death in the meantime. There are clearly several disturbing elements to this story.

First is the profound penetration which medical homicide has apparently achieved in the past ten years.

The Palliative care facility chosen has officially exercised its right to refuse medical homicide on grounds of moral principle. No euthanasia procedures are performed in that place. And yet notwithstanding this clear mandate: the doctors and nurses working in that institution are apparently relying on euthanasia as their go-to, first choice treatment.

Second, is the aggressive nature of this professional steering towards medical homicide.

In this case, professionals not only refused to take "No" for an answer (returning multiple times to the charge) but they actually went so far as to pretend that they possessed no other options to relieve the patient's distress. And, even after they were forced to admit that other measures (such as palliative sedation) are, in fact, available, they did not actually initiate appropriate procedures at once, but projected that initiation for some days farther off. And so it is that the patient's discomfort was only ended by natural death, not by the care of her physicians.

It is difficult to read that description without suspecting that medical homicide is literally the only "treatment" in which these professionals are now interested, at least for difficult cases, and that both pain and time are cynically seen as allies in obtaining consent to provide it. Or in other words: the apparent inability to relieve symptoms is not a failure, but a strategy.

And yet, what should most concern us about such evident malpractice, is the normalization of medical homicide, which it indicates, and the effects of that normalization --not only for Palliative Care, but for the entire medical industry.

For if patients are only sent from Long-term to Palliative Care in order to die, then doctors will soon ask why they should not kill those patients right now, and save them the journey.

And, indeed, the circle of this pessimism is already much wider than that. For we now see medical homicide adapted as a style of Preventive Medicine, whereby people are killed --not to relieve suffering-- but to avoid that suffering in the first place (such as at the moment of difficult diagnoses where consent is obtained under the weight of shock, contextual despondency and a pathetic trust in physician benevolence).

So also, we now see medical homicide proposed before major surgery, in cases of catastrophic accident, an in rehabilitation.

In the end, it is to prevent these outcomes that we must patiently wait: even at the very end, and even where death occurs under profound palliative sedation.

We must be willing to wait, because we do not wish the normalization of medical homicide --at the very end of Palliative Care-- to become the normalization of medical homicide before patients even arrive in that place.

Clearly, none of this is done to benefit the people. Let us not be fooled! Medical homicide is NOT OK where it is (at least for now). We must demand real end of life care --not patient liquidation. It is what normal patients want. It is what normal doctors wish to provide. It is what we all deserve. It is what we have handsomely paid for with our tax dollars.

Canada backs off on euthanasia for mental illness, but targets people with dementia.

This article was published by National Review online on October 9, 2026.

Wesley Smith

By Wesley J Smith

Some are celebrating Canada’s government “indefinitely suspending” legalizing euthanasia for mental illness as a great victory for life. Not me.

Let me explain. Of course, I am gratified that mental illness will not become grounds for being killed in 2027 as was scheduled. But note: In announcing the suspension, the government mooted legislation likely to pass that would have permanently outlawed killing for mental illness. Moreover, “indefinite” can mean years — or a month. So, it’s not a matter of principle.

But here’s the kicker. The government is now promoting euthanasia for people with dementia. From the Global News story:

[Justice Minister Sean] Fraser also said the government will “grant access to medical assistance in dying to people who have provided consent at a time when they still have capacity but know that they have been diagnosed with an illness that will take that capacity from them subsequently.”

This is sometimes referred to as “advance directive” or “advance request” in medical parlance. It often involves a competent person making a written request for MAID, with the intention that it would be honoured later, if and when they lose the capacity to make the decision for themselves: for example, in people suffering from worsening Alzheimer’s or dementia.

Once this proposal is law, people will be able to order themselves killed in the future when they reach a particular point of incapacity. And they wouldn’t be able to change their minds once they became incompetent because they would no longer be legally entitled to make their own care decisions. So, even if they were happy, not suffering, and now wanting to live, they would still be lethally injected.

This is already the law in the Netherlands and Belgium, and it has led to a horrific story. One Dutch woman signed such a document. When she repeatedly refused the lethal jab after becoming incompetent, the doctor drugged her coffee and started the termination. The patient woke up and struggled against the procedure. The doctor instructed the family to hold her down and completed the killing. Of course, a court later found the doctor not guilty of any crime.

Dementia patients are the next target of the culture of death, with advocacy increasing to include such people in the killable caste. Euthanasia activists already push VSED — suicide by self-starvation — for patients so diagnosed and even want caregivers forced to refuse their patients food and water if the person had so ordered when competent. Once that idea is accepted by society, lethal injections will soon follow because it will be seen as more humane.

So, I am not surprised that Canada’s leaders decided to shift their focus from the mentally ill — which caused a pushback — to cognitively incapacitated patients as euthanasia’s next big expansion. Many are terrified of dementia, so I suspect they believe it will be a lighter lift. And think of the money in health-care resources that will be saved!

Euthanasia (MAiD) by advance request is euthanasia without consent.

Alex Schadenberg

Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Justice Minister Sean Fraser and Health Minister Marjorie Michel stated on October 7, 2026 that the federal government will introduce legislation, that will prevent the implementation of euthanasia for mental illness as a sole criteria. 

However, the government legislation will also permit euthanasia by advanced request.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition opposes killing people but why is euthanasia by advance request even more egregious?

Euthanasia by advanced request is a very dangerous concept as it permits doctors and nurse practitioners to kill someone who has become incompetent, based on an advanced request. The person who is killed requested to be killed while competent but is now incompetent and cannot confirm the request and is not legally capable of changing their minds.

Euthanasia was originally legalized in Canada under the guise of being for mentally competent adults, who are capable of consenting and who freely "choose." Euthanasia by advanced request undermines these basic principles.

Euthanasia by advance request means that a person, while competent, legally declares their "wish" to be killed, and if the person becomes incompetent, the person could then be killed, even though the person is not capable of consenting. Therefore euthanasia by advance request is euthanasia without consent.

Further to that, once a person becomes incompetent, they are not legally able to change their mind, meaning that some other person will have the right to decide when the person dies, even if that person is living a happy life.

Therefore a person who is approved to die by euthanasia based on an advanced request, who becomes incompetent, will lose their right to change their mind.

This is what happened in the Netherlands with the “coffee euthanasia” death where  an incompetent woman, who had previously requested euthanasia, resisted during the euthanasia. The doctor responded by putting a sedative in the woman's coffee but the woman continued to resist, so the doctor had her family hold her down as the doctor completed the lethal poison injection.

If euthanasia by advance request is approved, the law will discriminate against incompetent people who did not make an advance request. The law will be challenged in the court as it will be argued that the person didn't make the advance request based on timing (the option didn't exist yet) or lack of knowledge that it was possible to make an advance request. Will the court, in the future, expand the law even further?

Once killing incompetent people is viewed as "compassionate" it will be considered cruel not to kill an incompetent person who is deemed to be suffering, because the person didn't make an advance request.

Finally, euthanasia by advanced request is outside of the federal government jurisdiction. Every Canadian province has advanced directive laws based on their constitutional power over healthcare. 

Québec already expanded their law to allow euthanasia by advanced request. Whereas I oppose euthanasia by advanced request I recognize that based on provincial jurisdiction concerning healthcare, Québec had the right to do so, whereas the federal government does not have the right to do so.

Thank you Tamara Jansen for sponsoring Bill C-218

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition is thankful to Tamara Jansen (MP) for sponsoring Bill C-218 and carrying this clear and important bill through parliament. Jansen's leadership was impressive.

Links to some excellent speeches by Tamara Jansen (Speech 1) (Speech 2) (Speech 3).

There were several other Members of Parliament who committed significant time and political capital to support Bill C-218, in particular Andrew Lawton (MP). 

Link to an excellent speech by Andrew Lawton (Speech)

Thank you also to the NDP caucus, Elizabeth May (Green Party) and Liberal members - Kent Macdonald and Marilyn Gladu who also supported Bill C-218.

The vote on Bill C-218 did not go as we had hoped but the campaign in support of Bill C-218 was excellent and resulted in the government announcing that they will introduce a government bill to prevent euthanasia for mental illness as a sole condition. We are not celebrating as we have not seen the language of the government bill, which may not have been written yet.

The government also announced that they will expand Canada's law to permit euthanasia by advanced request. This means that Canadians who declare, while competent, that they want to die by euthanasia, they can be killed at a later date, if they become incompetent.

The government announced that the bill will both prevent euthanasia for mental illness as a sole criteria and they will expand the law to allow euthanasia by advanced request. This is disgusting. The government will force Members of Parliament to vote on a bill that does both good and evil at the same time.

Since we have not seen the language of the bill we will not make a recommendation as to how Members of Parliament should vote on the bill.

We are nervous since euthanasia for mental illness, as a sole criteria is scheduled to begin March 17, 2027. The government does not have a lot of time.

Bill C-218 was defeated. What will happen next?

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Alex Schadenberg

It is too early to assess what will happen now that Bill C-218, the private members bill that was sponsored by Tamara Jansen (MP) was defeated in parliament by a vote of 187 to 141 on October 7. 

Bill C-218 would have amended the Criminal Code to prevent euthanasia for mental illness as a sole criteria.

The defeat of Bill C-218 was directly related to the announcement, the same day, at 12 noon by Justice Minister Sean Fraser and Health Minister Marjorie Michel. They stating that the federal government will introduce legislation, this fall, that will prevent the implementation of euthanasia for mental illness as a sole criteria. However, the government legislation will also permit euthanasia by advanced request.

Euthanasia by advanced request is a very dangerous concept as it would permit doctors and nurse practitioners to kill someone who has become incompetent, based on an advanced request. 

We knew that the language of Bill C-218 would have prevented euthanasia for mental illness, as a sole criteria, but we have not seen the language of the upcoming government bill. 

Language is everything. 

Who would make the final decision to poison an incompetent person to death?

The government bill, that we have not seen, may create a catch 22 situation where voting "No" to the bill would allow euthanasia for mental illness, as a sole criteria, but voting "Yes" to the bill would permit euthanasia by advanced request.

The government should separate the issues with two bills instead of one.

Until we analyse the language of the bill, we will not determine whether the government bill will actually prevent euthanasia for mental illness as a sole criteria.

Press Conference on October 7 at 11 am 

October 7 Press Conference

Dr Laurence Normand-Rivest, a family physician in Montréal who cares for geriatric patients and provides in-home palliative care, Dr Paul Saba a family physician in Lachine Québec who has personal experience with caring for people with mental health related trauma, Odile Marcotte, a retired professor from the Université du Québec à Montréal and a former deputy director of the Centre de recherches mathématiques, and a EPC Board member, and Alex Schadenberg, Executive Director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition spoke at a Press Conference.

Dr Normand-Rivest, Dr Saba, Marcotte and Schadenberg witnessed the historic and dissappointing vote on Bill C-218, at 3:30 pm in the parliamentary gallery.

Dr Laurence Normand-Rivest: Let us offer healing to the suffering

Presentation at the EPC Press Conference on October 7 in support of Bill C-218

Dr Laurence Normand-Rivest

My name is Laurence Normand-Rivest and I have been a family doctor for 13 years in Montreal, caring mainly for geriatric patients in clinic, long term facilities and providing palliative care at home for patients at the end of life. I also work 15 hours per week at the walk-in of my clinic where I meet patients of all ages and backgrounds.

I support Bill 218 to undo Bill C-39 coming into effect on March 17th 2027 that would allow those suffering solely from psychiatric illnesses to ask for MAID.

We should ask ourselves if homicide is an adequate answer to suicidal ideation. Have Canadians become lobbyists of suicide?

In 2016, Bill C14 defined MAID as assisted suicide provided by a doctor to a patient suffering from a terminal and grievous and irremediable condition in the context of a relationship between the patient and his doctor. Many safeguards have been removed since the introduction of the law, especially the initial delay of reflection of 10 days removed in 2021 with the introduction of Bill C7, which allows a patient in shock because of bad news to ask to be killed immediately. Bill C7 also expanded MAID for the people suffering from a serious illness when death is not foreseeable. With Bill C-39, patients wouldn’t need to have any physical illness to ask for assisted suicide.

Les idées suicidaires sont un symptôme de la dépression. Statistiques Canada estime que plus d’un Canadien sur 10 souffrira d’un épisode de dépression majeure dans sa vie. Des centaines de patients m’ont consultée au sans rendez-vous à cause de symptômes dépressifs. Je leur dis qu’ils peuvent prendre des rendez-vous de suivi avec moi et que je ne les lâcherai pas tant qu’ils ne seront pas guéris. La période initiale de détresse et d’idéation suicidaire, pouvant parfois durer des mois voire des années, est réversible pour la plupart des patients. J’ai même un patient qui avait été déclaré inapte au travail pour dépression chronique qui après dix ans, est redevenu assez fonctionnel pour réintégrer le travail qu’il aimait tant. Il est très réducteur de notre part de juger qu’une condition psychologique est irrémédiable, et plusieurs comorbidités physiques, comme des douleurs chroniques, nécessitent l’attention de plusieurs médecins spécialistes et de professionnels, ainsi que l’aide de ressources communautaires, avant de permettre au patient de sortir des bas-fonds de sa dépression.

English translation: 

(Suicidal thoughts are a symptom of depression. Statistics Canada estimates that more than one in ten Canadians will experience an episode of major depression in their lifetime. Hundreds of patients have consulted me at the walk-in clinic due to depressive symptoms. I tell them they can schedule follow-up appointments with me and that I will not abandon them until they have recovered. For most patients, the initial period of distress and suicidal ideation—which can sometimes last for months or even years—is reversible. I even have a patient who had been declared unfit for work due to chronic depression but, after ten years, became functional enough to return to the job he loved so much. It is overly simplistic to deem a psychological condition irreversible; furthermore, various physical comorbidities—such as chronic pain—require the attention of multiple medical specialists and professionals, as well as support from community resources, to help the patient emerge from the depths of depression.)

In 2023, Health Canada published the norms of practice of MAID, stating that patients should be informed of all the therapeutical options available to alleviate suffering. If the patients qualify for it, Health Canada stated that they should be informed of the possibility of MAID.

Why have we placed assisted suicide at the same level as healthcare? Have we designed suicide as a remedy to patients because of our incapacity to provide proper care to all? Roger Foley, a 51 year old man suffering from cerebellar ataxia hospitalized in London since 2016, has been offered MAID several times because our healthcare system couldn’t provide the homecare he was asking for.

I am very concerned for our patients who are psychologically in distress and wondering to whom they will turn to. We know that access to healthcare is often very difficult, especially for the most vulnerable, who are isolated, and prone to despair. AP News reported that patients have qualified for euthanasia because of isolation, poverty and obesity. In Montreal, I have heard of colleagues in my department administering MAID to a homecare patient who had chronic mobility issues but no grievous or irremediable condition, because he had asked for it a few days before Christmas in order not to be alone. Can MAID be a solution to the plague of loneliness? Have we thought of the despair of those suffering the loss of the deceased? How many victims will there be of our culture of death?

J’ai été responsable du service d’hébergement dans le CIUSSS Centre-Sud de Montréal pendant quelques années, et j’ai travaillé dans 8 CHSLD dans les CIUSSS du Sud et du Nord de Montréal, dont 2 unités où un grand nombre de patients souffrent de maladies psychiatriques chroniques. J’ai aussi parmi ma clientèle âgée au bureau et à domicile plusieurs patients souffrant de schizophrénie, de trouble bipolaire réfractaire ou de dépression chronique, dont plusieurs personnes invalides. Parmi eux, nombreux sont ceux qui trouvent une grande joie dans la simplicité du quotidien, et qui sont eux-mêmes des soignants par leur empathie qui apporte tant de consolation pour les personnes qu’ils rencontrent. La vulnérabilité ouvre le cœur à la souffrance de l’autre et nous permet d’y faire face.

English Translation: 

(I was in charge of the residential care department at the CIUSSS Centre-Sud de Montréal for several years and worked in eight long-term care facilities (CHSLDs) across the CIUSSS networks of southern and northern Montreal, including two units housing large numbers of patients with chronic psychiatric conditions. My caseload—both in the clinic and during home visits—also includes many elderly patients suffering from schizophrenia, treatment-resistant bipolar disorder, or chronic depression, including several individuals living with disabilities. Many of them find great joy in the simplicity of everyday life and act as caregivers themselves through an empathy that brings profound comfort to the people they meet. Vulnerability opens the heart to the suffering of others and enables us to face it.)

We know that suicidal thoughts are symptoms of an underlying depressed mood and that depression can be treated. Let us offer healing to the suffering, be present and faithful in our support, and not eliminate them.

Dr Paul Saba: Euthanasia of those with mental disorders is not mercy.

Presentation at the EPC Press Conference on October 7 in support of Bill C-218

Dr Paul Saba

My name is Dr Paul Saba. I am a family physician in Lachine Quebec.

One of my patients—a young mother of three small children was trapped in an abusive relationship. In despair, she attempted suicide by hanging. Found just in time by an neighbour, her life was saved. Had she been euthanized, there would have been no second chances. Today, she’s grateful to be alive, having had another child, and is now a grandmother to four grandchildren. 

Her story is a reminder that the darkest moments can give way to new beginnings—if we give people the chance to get better.

From a legal perspective, people with mental disorders who request  “Medical Aid in Dying (MAID)” a euphemism in Canada for euthanasia or assisted suicide, do not meet the criteria for free and informed consent, as the desire to die is often a symptom of mental illness. 

A Harvard School of Public Health study found that nine out of ten people who attempted suicide but survived did not die by suicide after receiving treatment. With proper care, the desire for suicide often disappears.  

Ninety percent of people who die by suicide have a mental disorder at the time they end their lives. Most who attempt or complete suicide do not truly want to die—they want an escape their emotional distress. 

I have spent my life caring for people at their lowest—facing distress, despair, disease and deprivation. What I’ve learned is that every life is valuable and worth fighting for. True compassion means supporting people through their dark times, not ending their lives.  

When someone turns to their physician in crisis, the doctor’s duty is to help them find a way out, not to offer death as a solution. A physician must stand with their patient and offer them treatment and help them find hope.  

People with mental disorders need proper care and support from psychiatrists, psychologists, and social workers. Many live precarious financial or social situations and need help with housing and food security. Our social and healthcare systems have failed them. 

Instead of expanding access to death, Canada must build a robust healthcare system that invests in world-class palliative care, mental health services, and social supports for people to live healthier and with dignity.  

Euthanasia of those with mental disorders is not mercy. It is murder masquerading as compassion. It is important that Members of Parliament support Bill C218 and stop the expansion of euthanasia to those with mental disorders. 

Euthanasia based on mental illness should never be approved

Presentation at the EPC Press Conference on October 7 in support of Bill C-218

Alex Schadenberg

My name is Alex Schadenberg and I am the Executive Director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

EPC opposes (MAiD), also known as euthanasia, as it constitutes the killing of a human being.

Euthanasia based on mental illness should never be approved. The law requires that a person have an “irremediable” medical condition to be approved for euthanasia and yet experts, for the most part, agree that it is impossible to determine which patient is irremediable and which one will get better.

The concept of euthanasia based on mental illness as a sole criteria is particularly concerning because the person’s mental condition might be driving them to suicidal ideation. 

I recently received the following story that explains our concerns through Carling Rygielski’s personal experience. Carling wrote: 

I am 30 years old, happily married, and a mother to two beautiful children. If you had asked me when I was a teenager where I would be at 30, I would have probably answered that I wouldn’t make it to 30.

I suffered from major depressive disorder, OCD, PTSD (albeit undiagnosed until my early twenties) since I was about 14. During those years, I frequently engaged in acts of self-harm. Though I didn’t have the words to explain it at the time, it is very clear to me now why I hurt myself as a child.

By the time I was 20, I truly felt suicidal ideation was going to be a lifelong battle. Every day was agony. I knew I needed critical care when I was speaking to a friend; I heard myself audibly share a thought pattern that had become so normal for me: “Every time I enter a room, the first thing my brain does is figure out how I could kill myself in that room. It's like a safety blanket that I have an escape route.”

I am incredibly grateful for the support of my parents, therapists, and doctors who supported me during this time to find the care I needed to reclaim my life. At the age of 21, after years of trying everything else, I decided to try medication.

It saved my life.

Of course, there were still speed bumps and moments that, at the time, felt they would be never-ending. Times where there was no light at the end of the tunnel. But then there was a new day.

I never attempted suicide because of my family.

I never attempted suicide because I was scared.

I never attempted suicide because when I went to my doctor to share the battle I had been facing for 7 years, she didn’t tell me I had an option of assisted suicide. In all the conversations we had, all of the time we spent looking for solutions; MAiD was never one of them.

Every morning I wake up, I see my beautiful children. How the morning light covers them, with their sleepy eyes. I hear the sounds of the world around me. I have my coffee. I am so grateful for this life. However mundane or extraordinary, I am so grateful I made it.

Please help to fight the good fight. Vote to pass Bill C-218.

Thank you Carling for sharing your personal story.