The Netherlands is euthanizing children.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Kevin Yuill was published by Spiked on June 28, 2026 concerning the expansion of euthanasia in the Netherlands to now allow children to be euthanized.

Article: Child euthanasia confirmed in the Netherlands (Read).

Yuill, who is emeritus professor of history at the University of Sunderland and CEO of Humanists Against Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia explains:

For the first time in the history of the Netherlands, a child has been euthanised by the state. The Dutch health minister revealed this week that Sophie Hermans, a child under the age of 12, was given a lethal injection in late 2025.

This case follows another relaxation of the safeguards on euthanasia in the Netherlands. In 2002, the Dutch decriminalised euthanasia and assisted suicide for competent adults. The law expanded to cover 16- and 17-year-olds, with parental consultation, and 12- to 15-year-olds with parental consent. In 2023, another change in the law allowed children under the age of 12, according to Dutch MP Harry Bevers, to ‘die with dignity’ if there is no possibility of recovery and they faced unbearable pain and distress.

The Netherlands didn't technically change their euthanasia law but rather they extended the Groningen Protocol, which allowed euthanasia of newborns, to include children under the age of 12. Yuill continued:

Euthanasia in the Netherlands is officially only permitted if the request comes from the patient and if a doctor agrees that they are suffering unbearably. But how can a minor request something a child cannot possibly comprehend – namely, the end of his or her life? How can a young child understand the need to maintain his or her dignity? The age of consent for sex is 16 in the Netherlands, and those below the age of 18 cannot legally get married. The Dutch government advises that children under the age of 15 should not use social media. And yet, Dutch children now have the ‘right’ to request a lethal injection.

In fact, the Netherlands appears to be moving relentlessly and thoughtlessly towards a euthanasia model employed in Europe in the 1930s. Then, euthanasia proposals began as requests from patients. However, when Nazi Germany began its euthanasia programme in 1939, the ‘patients’ were generally children with physical and intellectual disabilities. They did not consent – let alone request – euthanasia.

Yuill states that doctors in the Netherlands are not the same as doctors in Nazi Germany, nonetheless child euthanasia suggests that some lives are not worth living.

Yuill shares some of the crazy euthanasia stories from the Netherlands and then states:

Similarly, the expansion of euthanasia to children was motivated – in the words of then health minister Ernst Kuipers – by the hope it would ‘end the “dilemma for doctors” to administer euthanasia to young children who can’t decide for themselves’. The voluntary part of ‘voluntary’ euthanasia seems to have disappeared.

Yuill explains that most Canadians were unaware that Canada had planned to expand euthanasia to mental illness alone in March 2027.

Yuill ends the article by stating:

All of this is why we in the UK must look very critically at the legislation recently brought forward by Labour MP Lauren Edwards. The bill – which supporters will not allow to be amended – is not safe in its current form. Indeed, that is why there were 1,200 amendments tabled when it was first introduced by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater. And the experience of every jurisdiction where euthanasia is legal would tell us that it would only get worse.

Belgium expanded euthanasia to children in February 2014.

In February 2023 a Canadian parliamentary committee decided that Canada should expand euthanasia to children (mature minors).

Euthanasia, once legal, always expands.

Patient autonomy meets the ‘Groningen Protocol’ (euthanasia of newborns)

Killing of the incapable increases lethal pressure on capable patients.

Gordon Friesen

By Gordon Friesen

It has been repeatedly and fallaciously claimed that medical 'assistance in dying' is (and always shall be) an exercise of patient autonomy; that it poses no threat to incapable patients.

However, the legalization of medical homicide, in the alleged context of choice, has also sparked the rapid advancement of other variations, where autonomy is either limited, or impossible, and whose justification depends, not upon choice, but upon the objective judgment of medical circumstances.

This point is most emphatically illustrated by present Canadian consideration(1) of the Dutch ‘Groningen Protocol’,(2) which practice originally included the infanticide of babies up to 12 months, and is now being considered to include children up to 12 yrs (3). Clearly, no one might pretend that such deaths reflect autonomous choice.

Normalized infanticide, of course is extremely problematic on its own. For decisions which doctors (and parents) might previously have worried over, long and hard, will now become routine. Crucial enabling concepts which echo the worst phase of twentieth century eugenics, that is, concepts such as ‘incompatibility with life’,(4)  will become increasingly elastic.

From a situation analogous to the historically extreme (and exceedingly rare) destruction of clearly inedible food, prospective parents will inevitably pass to the capricious practice of modern shoppers at the supermarket, disdainfully rejecting any fruit with the slightest blemish.

However our present interest with legal infanticide most closely concerns its relation to the evolution of medical homicide more generally.

Unsurprisingly, our adversaries simply deny any connection. According to the mendacious sophistry thus employed: infanticide cannot be an extension of MAID, because MAID is legally defined to require an informed consent, of which infants are incapable!

However (as we must reply) infanticide by doctor is clearly a form and extension of medical homicide (of which MAID was only the first permitted instance). And this fact both underscores, once again, the importance of employing proper language; and irrefutably demonstrates the expansion of medical homicide beyond the capacity border.

But there is more. For just as the assumed legitimacy of poisoning capable patients suggests a similar legitimacy for the incapable, so also, this allegedly objective justification of medical homicide turns back upon itself: to increase the pressure upon non-compliant, capable patients, to more readily accept their proffered fate.

For once the principle is openly proclaimed --that imperfect life does not deserve to live-- how can people be expected to accept imperfection in others, or in themselves?

In other words: to protect the incapable is also to protect ourselves.

Gordon Friesen, May 19, 2026

       (1) Schadenberg, Alex, Is Euthanasia of Newborns with Disabilities next?, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, January 16, 2026 https://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2026/01/is-euthanasia-of-newborns-with.html
    (2) Verhagen, Eduard, M.D., J.D., and Sauer, Pieter J.J. , M.D., Ph.D., The Groningen Protocol — Euthanasia in Severely Ill Newborns, N Engl J Med 2005;352:959-962, March 10, 2005 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp058026
    (3) Schadenberg, Alex, The Netherlands plans to extend euthanasia to children, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, April 14, 2023 https://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2023/04/the-netherlands-to-extend-euthanasia-to.html
    (4) Zhuang, Zara, ‘Stop saying fetuses with disabilities are incompatible with life, The Irish Times, Nov 25 2014, https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/stop-saying-fetuses-with-disabilities-are-incompatible-with-life-1.2014538

Is Euthanasia of Newborns with Disabilities next?

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, 

Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Anna Farrow wrote an article that was published by the Western Standard on January 3, 2026 titled: Canada's Chilling Next Step - MAiD for babies.

Farrow explains how the disturbing concept of euthanasia of newborns was introduced into Canada's euthanasia debate:

Most Canadians disagree strongly with the concept of euthanasia for babies. We know this because every time the topic comes up, the public’s response is one of instant horror. So why does it keep coming up?

The issue first surfaced in 2022 when Louis Roy of the Quebec College of Physicians (CMQ) appeared before Parliament’s Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD). The committee was examining plans to expand MAiD beyond terminal illness to cover cases of mental illness as well as to accommodate advanced requests and mature minors. But Roy’s advocacy went even farther. He also suggested MAiD could be considered for “babies from birth to one year of age” who are born with severe deformities or disabilities.

Farrow continues:

The public response was immediate shock. On CBC Radio, Liberal Disabilities Minister Carla Qualtrough snapped, “There is no world where I would accept that.” The reaction was sufficiently negative that even pro-life activists assumed it was a dead-end issue.

This past September, however, several international media stories on Canada’s MAiD program have re-ignited the baby MAiD debate. A long feature in the magazine The Atlantic headlined “Canada is Killing Itself” compared Roy’s baby euthanasia proposal to the policies of Nazi Germany — an argument that caused instant outrage among pro-MAiD lobby groups. Then the British newspaper Daily Mail asked the CMQ for an update on its stance and was told the organization now believes “medical assistance in dying may be an appropriate treatment for babies suffering from extreme pain” and that “parents should have the opportunity to obtain this care for their infant.”

Farrow writes about the fact that the most recent Canadian euthanasia data indicates that in 2024 there were 16,499 euthanasia deaths with 76,475 recorded deaths from legalization until December 31, 2024.

Considering that we are now in January 2026, There has likely been at least 94,000 euthanasia deaths since legalization.

Farrow explains that, in the Netherlands, the Groningen protocol has been in place for many years, a protocol which permits euthanasia of newborns with disabilities.

Canada continues to debate euthanasia for mental illness alone.

In 2021, when Canada expanded its euthanasia law by passing Bill C-7, that legislation permitted euthanasia for mental illness alone, meaning that mental illness was the only criteria for approval. The issue of euthanasia for mental illness remains very contentious, which is why the previous Liberal government delayed the implementation of euthanasia for mental illness alone until March 2027.

Currently Canada is debating a private members bill (Bill C-218) that is sponsored by Tamara Jansen (MP) Bill C-218 would reverse the section of the law that will permit euthanasia for mental illness alone starting in March 2027.

Bill C-218 debate (Article Link).

As for euthanasia of children, the parliamentary euthanasia committee released a report in February 2023 calling on the extension of euthanasia in Canada to mature minors.

I responded to the February 15, 2023 (AMAD) report by stating:

The report by the Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying (AMAD) was tabled in the House of Commons on February 15, 2023 calling for a drastic expansion of euthanasia (MAiD) in Canada. Among the recommendations, the report recommended that euthanasia be expanded to include children "mature minors."

Recommendation 19 in the report stated:

That the Government of Canada establish a requirement that, where appropriate, the parents or guardians of a mature minor be consulted in the course of the assessment process for MAID, but that the will of a minor who is found to have the requisite decision-making capacity ultimately take priority.

This means that parents or guardians may or may not be consulted, in the euthanasia death of a child that is deemed to have decision-making capacity.

To understand Recommendation 19 better we need to go back to the draft policy developed by the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto on euthanasia for "mature minors" that was published as a report in the Journal of Medical Ethics in September 2018.

• Article: Sick Kids Hospital Toronto will euthanize children with or without parental consent (Link).

Sick Children's hospital draft policy applied the same "ethics" for mature minors to make medical decisions as for making a decision to be killed.

Euthanasia for mature minors is one issue but euthanasia of newborns with disabilities can only be described as eugenics.

Sadly, once killing by euthanasia becomes a legal option the law will continue to expand. There is only one ethical line in the sand, that being, it is illegal to kill. Once killing is OK the only remaining questions are: who can do the killing and for what reasons.

Previous articles about this topic:

• Canada's euthanasia lobby is pushing for child euthanasia (Link). 
• Australian Human Rights Commission pushes Assisted Suicide for Children. (Link).
• The euthanasia lobby is pushing for child and infant euthanasia (Link).
• Canadian children may be euthanized with or without parental consent (Link).

The Netherlands already allows infant euthanasia.

This article was published by National Review online on August 25, 2025.

Wesley Smith

By Wesley J Smith

An article in the Daily Mail sounds the alarm that permitting infant euthanasia — i.e., infanticide — is under serious consideration in Canada:

Canada‘s assisted suicide laws have continued rapidly expanding in recent years, with a group of doctors now pushing for disabled newborn babies to be euthanized. . . . As assisted deaths have become a major part of Canada’s health care system, the Quebec College of Physicians suggested legalizing euthanasia for infants born severely ill.

Canada has jumped so enthusiastically into the euthanasia abyss that I have little doubt that infanticide will eventually be allowed there. It’s only logical. If killing is an acceptable answer to suffering, why limit the killing to adults?

Besides, as the story briefly notes, the Netherlands already allows doctors to lethally inject disabled and terminally ill babies. There is even a bureaucratic checklist to guide the infanticide known as the “Groningen Protocol.” Here is what I wrote some 20 years ago when the protocol was first released:

The publishing of the Groningen Protocol isn’t designed to end the secret that is not a secret. It is intended to legitimize eugenic infanticide and move it from a crime tolerated by the, oh, so tolerant Dutch, to outright legality. In other words, the last vestige of protection left in the Netherlands against infanticide — that is, the technical illegality of killing babies in the Netherlands — is to be stripped away, including the protection against the killing of disabled infants not dependent on intensive care for survival.

In a more righteous world, allowing infanticide would make the Netherlands a pariah nation, but we have become morally stunted in the West, so what’s a little baby killing among friends? Many (but certainly, not all) in bioethics believe that killing babies that don’t suit us is morally acceptable — and not just Peter Singer. Indeed, the protocol was even published without criticism in the New England Journal of Medicine.

So, let us not be shocked by Canada’s threatening infanticide rumblings. Instead, let us look clear eyed at the policies that logically follow from eliminating suffering by eliminating the sufferer, and turn back from the metastasizing euthanasia cancer before we lose what remains of our moral compass.

Previous articles about this topic:

• Canada's euthanasia lobby is pushing for child euthanasia (Link). 
• Australian Human Rights Commission pushes Assisted Suicide for Children. (Link).
• The euthanasia lobby is pushing for child and infant euthanasia (Link).
• Canadian children may be euthanized with or without parental consent (Link).

Netherlands: 517 people died by euthanasia without request in 2021.

Netherlands: 22% of the assisted deaths were not reported in 2021.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director,
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Netherlands has had a problem with euthanasia without request (LAWER) and the under-reporting of euthanasia since the inception of its euthanasia law.

Every five years the Netherlands government has commissioned a study to determine the number of deaths by medical and end-of-life decisions. The study is done by researchers who send questionnaires to physicians to determine how a random person died within a given year.

The questions seek to determine the number of deaths from all causes, including euthanasia, assisted suicide and ending of life without explicit request. The questionnaires allow the physician to respond anonymously, the data effectively uncovers the actual number of assisted deaths within a given year.

The Netherlands 2021 study (one year later than usual) found that there were 9,799 assisted deaths representing 9038 euthanasia deaths, 245 assisted suicide deaths and 517 ending of life without explicit request (LAWER).

LAWER involves the intentional ending of a person without an explicit request. I oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide but I recognize that killing someone without request or consent remains a criminal homicide in nearly every jurisdictions, even when it is tolerated.

The 2021 study indicated that there were 517 LAWER deaths in the Netherlands representing approximately 0.3% of all deaths or 5.2% of all assisted deaths.

It is important to note that 6 of the deaths were newborns, also known as infanticide who would have been killed based on the Groningen protocol. Newborns with disabilities can be injected with lethal drugs in the Netherlands when a parent and doctor agree that the prospects for the child are poor or the child is considered "incompatible with life."

As stated, the Netherlands government commissions a study every five years. The 2015 study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) in an article titled: End-of-Life Decisions in the Netherlands over 25 years. The researchers published the 2015 study as a comparison to the previous studies.

The data from the 2015 study indicated that there were 7254 assisted deaths representing 6672 euthanasia deaths, 150 assisted suicide deaths, 431 ending of life without explicit request.

The 517 LAWER deaths in 2021 and the 431 LAWER deaths in 2015 represent a similar percentage of all deaths in the Netherlands meaning that doctors in the Netherlands continue, at a similar rate, to kill people without an explicit request or consent.

Do physicians in other countries, including Canada intentionally kill people without an explicit request or consent. The answer is likely YES, but unlike the Netherlands and Belgium, other countries are not commissioning studies with specific questions to uncover the truth.

The issue of under-reporting of euthanasia in the Netherlands.

The Netherlands 2021 euthanasia report stated that the number of reported euthanasia deaths in the Netherlands was to 7666. The report also indicated that there were 206 reported euthanasia deaths for early stage dementia and 6 reported euthanasia deaths for late stage dementia and 115 reported euthanasia deaths for "severe" mental illness.

The data from the 2021 Netherlands government study found that there were 9,799 assisted deaths but the data from the Netherlands 2021 euthanasia report indicated that there were 7666 assisted deaths. Therefore (9,799 - 7,666) there were 2133 unreported assisted deaths in the Netherlands in 2021 representing approximately 22% of all assisted deaths.

Has under-reporting of euthanasia been a consistent problem in the Netherlands?

The 2015 study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine End-of-Life Decisions in the Netherlands over 25 years indicated that there were 7254 assisted deaths in 2015.

The Netherlands 2015 official euthanasia report stated that there were 5561 reported assisted deaths but the data from the 2015 Netherlands government study indicated that there were 7254 assisted deaths meaning that there were 1693 unreported assisted deaths in 2015 representing about 23% of all assisted deaths in 2015.

When examining the data from previous Netherlands studies, it appears that more than 20% of all assisted deaths are consistently not reported.

Does Canada have a similar problem with under-reporting?

Canada legalized euthanasia (MAiD) in 2016. The Canadian government has not commissioned a death study to determine if abuse of the law occurs. The Québec euthanasia data indicates that there is under-reporting of euthanasia.

Amy Hasbrouck, the past president of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and the leader of Toujours-Vivant (Not Dead Yet) analyzed the Quebec 2021-22 euthanasia report and found a discrepancy of 289 euthanasia deaths. Hasbrouck reported:

The Commission reported 3,663 euthanasia deaths declared by doctors during the fiscal year (p. 13), while the number of euthanasia deaths reported by facilities (3,629) and the Collège des Médecins du Québec (323) totalled 3,952 (p. 25 at note 25); a discrepancy of 289 deaths.

Hasbrouck found in the 2021 - 22 Québec annual euthanasia report a 7% likely under-reporting rate. Under-reporting of euthanasia may be occurring in the rest of Canada, but it is impossible to determine what is actually happening unless the Canadian government commissions a similar study to the Netherlands 5 year studies.

American assisted suicide laws.

There is evidence that under-reporting of assisted suicide is likely occurring in the US states that have legalized assisted suicide. 

For instance, the 2024 Oregon assisted suicide report indicated that there were 376 reported assisted suicide deaths in 2024. (There were likely close to 400 reported assisted suicide deaths since every year a percentage of the assisted suicide reports are received late).

The 2024 Oregon assisted suicide report indicated that the ingestion status is unknown in 178 cases. When the ingestion status is unknown, it means that the 178 people were approved for assisted suicide and received the lethal drugs but the Oregon Health Authority OHA does not know if they died by assisted suicide. Since no oversight exists and no research has not been done to confirm how these people died therefore it is impossible to say with certainty that unreported assisted suicide deaths are happening, but it is likely.

My conclusions.

The Netherlands 2021 study indicates that euthanasia without explicit consent and unreported euthanasia deaths continue.

In August 2013 I published the book: Exposing Vulnerable People to Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide which examined the data from the Netherlands and Belgian euthanasia studies. The purpose of the book was to warn the world that the legalizing euthanasia did not eliminate medical homicide, that in fact normalizing euthanasia appeared to increase the number of medical homicides.

Exposing Vulnerable People concluded that - when an assisted death was done "outside of the parameters of the law" that the death was rarely reported. It is likely that, if the researchers closely examined the 517 life-ending without request assisted deaths in 2021 they would likely find that most of these deaths were not reported.

Exposing Vulnerable People also concluded that the majority of LAWER deaths were done in a hospital to an incompetent person who was unable to consent. 

Without a data breakdown of the 2021 study data I cannot assume a similar conclusion but earlier data clearly indicated this reality.

I found it interesting that unlike the previous Netherlands government death studies (every 5 years), there was no analysis of the data which is why I am writing this article in 2025.

The 2021 Netherlands study proves that euthanasia deaths without explicit request or consent continues to happen and that more than 20% of the Netherlands euthanasia deaths continue to be not reported.

The data from the study should also ask the question, is there a similar phenomenon of killing patients without explicit request or consent happening in Canada or other countries and it should ask how many unreported euthanasia deaths happen in Canada and other countries? A study needs to be commissioned by neutral researchers to determine the answers to these questions.

Legalizing euthanasia and assisted suicide does not eliminate the phenomenon of medical homicide and the normalization of euthanasia seems to justify these acts.

Australia Human Rights Commission pushes Assisted Suicide for Children

This article was published by National Review online on January 4, 2024.

Wesley Smith

By Wesley J Smith

Assisted suicide is being legalized all over Australia, and I fear the country is going to go the dark route Canada has after it legalized euthanasia. Case in point: There is a bill before the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) to legalize assisted suicide. The Human Rights Commission criticizes the proposal for restricting assisted-suicide eligibility to adults:

Improvements to the proposed scheme:

We detail below certain of our earlier recommendations that have not been incorporated into the Bill.

1. Access for Children and Young People under 18: the current scheme is limited to individuals over the age of 18 years old. Human rights principles require due consideration for the rights of children and young people, including their right to access health care without discrimination and their right to have their views taken into account.

It is the Commission’s view that this extends to decisions for a child or young person to voluntarily end their life with dignity in the same circumstances as adults: namely where they have a condition that is advanced, progressive and expected to cause their death, where they are suffering intolerably, where they are acting voluntarily, and where they have demonstrated maturity and capacity to make such a decision. We recognise that there may need to be additional steps and safeguards for children and young people, particularly where the views of parents and carers differ from the young person or from each other.

If adopted, this means that “mature” minors would be able to be made dead without their parents’ permission and children no matter how young could be put down.

Canada isn’t there yet, but the same approach has been seriously proposed in that country. Belgium and the Netherlands already permit euthanizing children, and the Netherlands allows infanticide under the “Groningen Protocol.” 

Previous articles on this topic:

• The euthanasia lobby is pushing for child and infant euthanasia (Link).
•  Canadian children may be euthanized with or without parental consent (Link).

The Netherlands plans to extend euthanasia to children.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The NLTimes reported on April 14 that the Dutch government has agreed to extend euthanasia to children, under the age of 12. The article states:

Health Minister Ernst Kuipers announced in a press release on Friday that he expects the regulation to be implemented within the year. The new guidelines will probably only apply to about five to ten children annually for whom “life termination is the only viable option to end the child's hopeless and unbearable suffering,” said Kuipers.

This means that the Netherlands government plans to extend the Groningen Protocol, which applies to newborns, to children between the ages of 1 and 12, rather than amending the euthanasia legislation to include children under the age of 12. 

Extending the Groningen Protocol is very concerning because it permits euthanasia of newborns who are experiencing current or possible future suffering. If you use the same definitions for children under 12, there will be euthanasia deaths of children who may have treatable conditions.

In October 2020, Netherlands Health Minister Hugo de Jonge announced that the government was planning to permit child euthanasia. According to the DutchNews.nl:

De Jonge added that current laws would not need to be amended. Rather, doctors would be exempted from prosecution for carrying out an approved euthanasia on a child.

The NL Times reported today that:

Following life termination, a review committee and the Public Prosecution Service will examine whether the procedure was carried out with due care.

This means that the decision will only be reviewed after the child has died.

Following the annoucement in October 2020, an effective campaign opposing child euthanasia in the Netherlands was launched by a group of Netherlands citizens and the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition. A petition with more than 100,000 people opposing child euthanasia.

I am also concerned that the Canadian govenment will decide to follow the lead of the Netherlands and also extend euthanasia to children.

There was a record number of Netherlands euthanasia deaths in 2022 with 8720 reported deaths representing a 14% increase from 2021 and 5.1% of all deaths in the Netherlands. 288 of the 8720 were based on the person having dementia. 

The World Medical Association declared in 1987  a statement that was referred in 2005 stating:

“Euthanasia, that is the act of deliberately ending the life of a patient, even at the patient’s own request or at the request of close relatives, is unethical. This does not prevent the physician from respecting the desire of a patient to allow the natural process of death to follow its course in the terminal phase of sickness.”

More articles on the topic:

• Euthanasia experts advocate for child euthanasia with or without consent (Link).
• New York Times article promotes infanticide (Link).
• Newsweek promotes infant euthanasia (Link).
• Euthanasia of newborns with disabilities and infanticide.
• Dutch paediatricians want to legalise euthanasia for children under 12.
• Euthanasia of babies with disabilities.
• The Groningen Protocol for euthanasia of disabled babies in the Netherlands.

Euthanasia without brakes.

This article was published by the Epoch Times on December 7, 2022.

By Wesley Smith:

Wesley Smith

In my first ever anti-euthanasia piece, which was published in Newsweek back in 1993, I warned that legalizing assisted suicide would lead to organ harvesting of those killed by doctors “as a plum to society.” For my trouble. I was called alarmist and hysterical—and those were the nice letters.

Alas, rather than being alarmist, I was prescient. Today in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Canada, people who ask to be killed by doctors are sometimes organ harvested too. Not only that, but the phenomenon was celebrated in the media as “a growing boon to organ donation” in the Ottawa Citizen, with the story sighing, “Ontarians who opt for medically assisted deaths (MAiD) are increasingly saving or improving other people’s lives by also including organ and tissue donation as part of their final wishes.”

Understand that in Canada, one need not be terminally ill to qualify for a lethal injection. The patient can be disabled, elderly and lonely, or chronically ill—and starting next year, people with mental illnesses will also be eligible for killing. Not only that, but once someone is accepted for euthanasia in Ontario, he or she doesn’t receive suicide prevention. No. No. Instead, the Trillium Gift of Life Network in the province contacts the soon-to-be-killed person to ask for their heart, liver, and kidneys. As the story reports, “Ontario, through Trillium, immediately moved to the forefront of organ and tissue donation through MAiD, becoming the first jurisdiction in the world to proactively reach out to those who had been approved for assisted death to discuss donation.”

Remember, many of these patients wouldn’t be dying if they weren’t going to be lethally injected. That serves the organ harvesting agenda well, according to the Citizen, “MAiD donations also typically provide more time for testing donor organs and better matching with recipients.” Again, that time lag would also permit intensive suicide prevention efforts, but that isn’t a public policy priority in Canada when one asks for euthanasia.

But here’s the thing that rarely gets mentioned: Conjoining organ donation and euthanasia can be the tipping point for deciding to choose to be killed by a suffering patient, particularly one who is mentally ill. Remember, these are despairing people who could easily come to think that their deaths have greater value than their lives. It’s a monstrous abandonment.

​I wish I could say that organ donation conjoined with lethal injections was the only slide down the slippery slope I have predicted correctly in my decades of anti-euthanasia advocacy. Here’s a short list of some of the other wrongs I warned against that have, indeed, come to pass. 

• Pediatric Euthanasia: If killing is a “compassionate medical treatment,” as the right to die movement says, how can it be denied to children? Eventually, it won’t be, I have predicted. And sure enough: Belgium allows children of all ages to be euthanized and has publicly reported that children as young as 9 have been made dead by their doctors. Ditto, the Netherlands. The Dutch also allow doctors to commit active infanticide of babies born with serious disabilities or terminal illnesses. There is even a bureaucratic checklist for doctors to decide which babies can be killed known as the “Groningen Protocol.” 
• Killing People with Dementia: Another of my predictions warned that legalizing euthanasia would eventually spread to allowing people who aren’t competent to be killed. And so it came to pass. Belgium, the Netherlands, and soon Canada, permit people diagnosed with dementia to order themselves lethally injected after they become incompetent. Once the document is signed and the patient loses capacity, they can’t change their minds because their “former” selves now control what happens to them. This license to kill the now incapacitated has even led to one woman in the Netherlands being held down by her family as she struggled against being lethally injected. That was against the law, but the doctor was exonerated of committing a crime because the judge said she acted “in good faith.” Soon afterward, the Dutch Parliament changed the law to permit such non-voluntary killings to take place legally. 
• Euthanizing the Elderly: I have frequently pointed out that euthanasia activists promote the idea of allowing the elderly to die rather than face the infirmities of old age. Sure enough. Belgium and the Netherlands have both seen cases of joint euthanasia deaths by married couples who would rather both die than face the pain of widowhood. There was even one case in Belgium of a couple “who feared the future” being euthanized by a doctor—with the planned death arranged by their son. And in Canada, an elderly woman in a nursing home chose to be killed rather than be isolated from her family by COVID-19 protocols. Ironically, the very authorities who wouldn’t allow her family to visit her if she chose to live, permitted them to be present when she received the lethal injection. Can you imagine? 
• Death Doctor Shopping: I have warned frequently against “doctor shopping,” that is patients refused assisted suicide by their own doctors merely going to another doctor they know is willing to do the deed. Examples of such cases are rife. For example, in Belgium an oncologist euthanized a woman who had suffered lifelong depression, even though he was clearly not a medical expert in mental illness nor her treating doctor. Doctor shopping happens all of the time in this country too. It will soon get much worse with assisted suicide now permitted in states such as Oregon and Washington by telemedicine. Moreover, Oregon no longer requires that a patient requesting death be a resident, which means patients from all over the country may be able to access poison prescriptions from doctors they hardly know and may have only counseled with virtually. 
• Death on Demand: I have often remarked that the logic of euthanasia inevitably leads to death on demand for any reason that a suicidal person wants. Thus, I was appalled—but not shocked—when Germany’s highest court created both a fundamental right to suicide and the right to assist or be assisted in being made dead. And this right exists for any reason. The court ruled, “The right to a self-determined death is not limited to situations defined by external causes like serious or incurable illnesses, nor does it only apply in certain stages of life or illness. Rather, this right is guaranteed in all stages of a person’s existence.”
  

In all of this, I’m reminded of Canadian journalist Andrew Coyne’s lament, written more than 20 years ago, about the popular support for euthanasia he sensed in his country: 

“A society that believes in nothing can offer no argument even against death. A culture that has lost its faith in life cannot comprehend why it should be endured.”

If we don’t change our current cultural trajectory we will end up in the same dark corner as Canada, the Netherlands, and Belgium. And the real danger to our cultural wellbeing is that the people who now complacently assume that such warnings are alarmist will be the ones applauding the loudest when that dark time comes.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

Canada's Minister of disability inclusion opposes infant euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

A presentation by Dr Louis Roy for the Québec College of Physicians to The Special Joint Committee on MAiD on Friday September 7 urged Canada's Federal government to adopt a Netherlands Groningen style protocol to permit infant euthanasia.

Article: Infant euthanasia proposed by the Quebec College of Physicians (Link)

Article: Quebec College of Physicians slammed for justifying infant euthanasia (Link).

A CBC News article by Catherine Cullen and Alexandra Zabjek reported on October 22 that Carla Qualtrough told CBC radio's The House that:

"I find that completely shocking and unacceptable. I would never support going down that road,"

The CBC report stated:

Qualtrough, who is legally blind, said that while she can't speak on behalf of the entire government, "there is no world where I would accept that."

People often make incorrect assumptions about the quality of life that someone with a disability experiences, she said.

Extending assisted death to infants is not one of the topics the parliamentary committee has been tasked with exploring — although it is reviewing whether the practice should be available to so-called "mature minors" who would be old enough to offer informed consent.

Qualtrough also expressed concern that people with disabilities are asking for (MAiD) euthanasia based on poverty or an inability to receive necessary medical treatment. The article reported:

Qualtrough also said she hears frequently that some people with disabilities are seeking assisted deaths because they can't find adequate housing or sufficient care.

"Working with the disability community and hearing very regularly that people's options around MAID are being driven by lack of social supports is devastating," she said.

The CBC report stated that The Special Joint Committee on MAiD that was scheduled to table its report on October 17 has now had the committee report extended to February 17, 2023.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition is pleased that the committee report has been delayed but we remain concerned about the possible extension of the committee's mandate. We fear that the government is examining further areas of expansion of the euthanasia law.

Many people suggested that the Quebec College of Physicians only launched a trial balloon concerning infant euthanasia, nonetheless, the Netherlands approved the Groningen Protocol which permits infant euthanasia in 2005 and Belgium eliminated any age limit for euthanasia a few years ago.

Quebec College of Physicians slammed for justifying infant euthanasia

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Article: Infant euthanasia proposed by the Quebec College of Physicians (Link)

The National Post published a thorough article by Catherine Lévesque on October 11 titled: Quebec College of Physicians slammed for suggesting MAiD for severely ill newborns.

In the article Lévesque interviews people from the disability community, from the medical community and myself.

Lévesque explains the issue:

Dr. Louis Roy, from the Quebec College of Physicians, told the Commons’ Special Joint Committee of Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) on Friday that his organization believes MAID can be appropriate for infants up to age one who are born with “severe malformations” and “grave and severe syndromes” for which their “prospective of survival is null, so to speak.”

Krista Carr

Lévesque first quotes from Krista Carr with Inclusion Canada;

“Most families of children born with disabilities are told from the start that their child will, in one way or another, not have a good quality of life,”

“Canada cannot begin killing babies when doctors predict there is no hope for them. Predictions are far too often based on discriminatory assumptions about life with a disability,”

Carr then says:

“An infant cannot consent to their own death. This isn’t MAID, it’s murder. And providing MAID to a person who cannot consent is a standard that is wildly dangerous for all persons with intellectual disabilities in Canada,”

 Alex Schadenberg

 

She then quotes me saying that legalizing infant euthanasia for babies who are will die is simply not necessary.

“Why would you then have to give the child a lethal dose? If the child is not going to survive, the child can be kept comfortable and die naturally. There’s no reason for us to kill the child. There’s no reason for us to do this at all,”

To further clarify the position of the Québec College of Physicians, Léveque quotes from a December 2021 press release:

The press release said that MAID could be an avenue for infants who are subject to “extreme suffering that cannot be soothed, coupled with very dark prognostics,” while adding that this treatment would have to be regulated by a “strict protocol.”

The College mentioned the Netherlands’ Groningen Protocol — a detailed process that includes unbearable suffering confirmed by at least one doctor and informed consent from both parents — as an avenue to explore in Canada for euthanasia for severely ill newborns.

It also recommended making MAID accessible to minors from 14 to 17 years old, with the authorization of parents or of a tutor, adding that suffering has no age and that it can be as intolerable as for adults.

Léveque continues the article by quoting comments made by National Post columnist Ben Woodfinden, who originally reported about Dr Roy's testimony:

“Assisted death or suicide isn’t even the right word for what’s being described here. A baby cannot consent, a baby cannot decide they want to end their own life, it’s not about any kind of ‘choice’ or ‘autonomy.’ It’s straight up infanticide,”

Dominic Evans

American disability activist and film maker, Dominic Evans told Léveque:

“I have many friends who were told this in infancy who have lived into adulthood and have thriving lives,”

“My disability was not diagnosed until I was four, but it was as though I had already ‘died’ because everybody was so abysmal towards being diagnosed with a disability.”

Léveque ends the article by quoting me (Alex Schadenberg). I told Léveque that infant euthanasia is not about "autonomy" or "choice" and it opens the door to further expansions.

“Now, it’s not about my autonomy, my choice. If I can do that to a newborn, why can’t I do that to someone who never asked for it, who never showed any interest in it but now has Alzheimer’s?”

He added that the accepted criteria have evolved quickly since C-14 was passed in 2016 and C-7 in 2021. The sunset clause that temporarily restricts MAID for people whose sole underlying medical condition is mental illness will expire in March 2023.

Catherine Lévesque has written a thorough article but further to this article, the Groningen Protocol is not limited to children who will almost certainly die anyway. It also approves death for infants who are suffering or are likely to experience possible future suffering.

Once the door to killing without consent is completely opened, the swath of people who become eligible for being killed expands exponentially.

Infant euthanasia proposed by the Quebec College of Physicians.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Article: Quebec College of Physicians slammed for justifying infant euthanasia (Link).

EPC has created a postcard opposing infant euthanasia to be sent to Members of Parliament (MP's). Order the postcards at no cost by contacting EPC at: 1-877-439-3348 or office@epcc.ca

A presentation by Dr Louis Roy for the Québec College of Physicians to The Special Joint Committee on MAiD on September 7 urged Canada's Federal government to adopt a protocol to permit infant euthanasia.

Dr Roy suggested that this should only be allowed in rare circumstances, such as a newborn who is unlikely to survive. 

Infant euthanasia opens the door to a new justification for killing since the baby lacks competence and is not autonomously capable of choosing to be killed. Infant euthanasia is a form of eugenics whereby protocols will determine which lives are worth living.

Euthanasia was sold to Canadians under the guise of competent adults freely choosing to have their lives ended based on terminal illness or unremittent suffering. Bill C-7, that was passed in March 2021, among other things, extended the reason for killing from terminal illness to chronic illness or disability.

If infant euthanasia is approved it may lead to the approval of euthanasia for people with dementia who never requested or indicated an interest in euthanasia since infant euthanasia creates the precedent that someone else, such as a power of attorney, can request that a person be killed.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition opposes all forms of euthanasia and assisted suicide, nonetheless, it is clear that expanding killing to babies negates the "safeguard" that only people who can capably request to die can be approved for death.

More articles on the topic:

• Netherlands euthanasia experts advocate for child euthanasia with or without consent (Link).
• New York Times article promotes infanticide (Link).
• Newsweek promotes infant euthanasia (Link).
• Euthanasia of newborns with disabilities and infanticide.
• Dutch paediatricians want to legalise euthanasia for children under 12.
• Euthanasia of babies with disabilities.
• The Groningen Protocol for euthanasia of disabled babies in the Netherlands.

Netherlands Health Minister Proposes Protocol for euthanasia of children under 12.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

• Sign the Petition: No to child euthanasia (Link).

The DutchNews.nl reported today that Dutch Health Minister Ernst Kuipers announced the intention to extend euthanasia to children, but without changing the law. Kuipers intends to extend the Groningen Protocol, which currently applies to babies, to include children under the age of 12.

An article by Peter McLaren Kennedy for EuroWeekly stated:

The proposed protocol contains seven criteria for euthanasia for those between one and 12. Doctors will have to be convinced the child’s suffering is unbearable and there is no possibility of a cure or a treatment to alleviate the pain.

The diagnosis would have to be fully discussed with the child’s parents as well as the possibility of euthanasia, for which both parents will have to give their permission.

Doctors will also discuss the procedure with the child in a way the child will understand and will only proceed if the child is in no way opposed to it.

In addition, doctors will have to consult at least one independent doctor who will be required to evaluate if all the criteria have been met before euthanasia can take place.

The concept is currently out to consultation with Kuipers to present the final concept in October, when he will also announce when the protocol will come into force.

In October 2020, Netherlands Health Minister Hugo de Jonge announced that the government would amend or permit child euthanasia. According to the DutchNews.nl:

De Jonge added that current laws would not need to be amended. Rather, doctors would be exempted from prosecution for carrying out an approved euthanasia on a child.

At that time, an effective campaign opposing child euthanasia was established by a group of Netherlands citizens and the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition ran a petition with more than 100,000 people opposing child euthanasia. The Netherlands government did not extend euthanasia to children.

This latest announcement sets a dangerous precedent. The Groningen Protocol permits euthanasia of newborns who are experiencing current or possible future suffering. If you use the same definitions for children under 12, there will be many euthanasia deaths of children who may have treatable conditions. Further to that, there are many medical conditions that possibly lead to future suffering.

As much as I oppose euthanasia in general, it would be more honest if the Netherlands parliament debated and passed clear legal guidelines rather than avoid the contentious debate and approve a killing protocol that will enable doctors and parents to make lethal decisions in a back room.

health minister Ernst Kuipers

Read more at DutchNews.nl:

health minister Ernst Kuipers has said in a briefing to MPs.

Read more at DutchNews.nl: