The Netherlands set to expand euthanasia to people who are not sick or dying.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Dutch government has decided to expand the euthanasia law to include people who are not physically or psychologically sick but who believe that their "life is completed." NL Times reporter, Janene Pieters wrote:

The Dutch government wants to adjust the Euthanasia Act so that people who aren’t sick, but feel that their life is completed, can end their lives with assisted suicide. This will only be allowed under “strict and rigorous criteria”, the government wrote to parliament. The majority of parliamentarians support the plan. 

Coalition parties VVD and PvdA and opposition party support the proposal to change the law. That gives the proposal a majority vote in Parliament, with 88 out of 150 parliamentarians in favor. In the Senate the three parties only represent 33 out of 75 senators, however. With the Christian parties set 100 percent against the proposal, this means that the PVV, SP or a collection of smaller parties will also have to support this change in the euthanasia law for it to be implemented.

The Dutch government is going against the recommendations of their parliamentary committee. The NL Times reported:

The committee, chaired by Paul Schnabel, concluded that nothing has to be changed about the Euthanasia Act. The current law provides enough space for “most” people to qualify for euthanasia if they consider their life completed, according to the committee. The committee was also against the introduction of a so-called “suicide pill” as there is to great a risk of it falling into the wrong hands.

The report in the Dutchnew.nl increased my concerns by stating:

In their briefing, the ministers say that ‘elderly’ people with a consistent and well-considered wish to die – whether ill or not – should be able to take a drug to end their lives. Family members would not be allowed to administer the drug. 

The practice would not be considered euthanasia, in which the patient is said to be suffering unbearably, and in which doctors have an active role.

The expansion of euthanasia in the Netherlands has been happening for many years. Based on the 2015 Dutch government statistics, the number of euthanasia deaths increased by 289% since 2006 with 5561 reported euthanasia deaths. Among those deaths there were 109 people who died by euthanasia based on dementia, up from 81 in 2014 and 56 people died by euthanasia based on psychiatric reasons in 2015, up from 41 in 2014.

Those who believe that euthanasia can be controlled, then this news should cause them to think again. Once a nation permits doctors, or others, to kill their people by lethal injection, then that nation has opened the door to an ever expanding option to kill. Woe to Canada who recently approved medical killing.

Colorado: No on assisted suicide proposition 106. It is fatally flawed.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Recently the Denver Post published an editorial urging people to Vote No on Proposition 106 because it lacks proper safeguards.

The NO on Proposition 106 website contains an excellent evaluation of what Colorado voters are being asked to vote YES or No to during the November election. These are some of the fatal flaws that the No on Proposition 106 website explains.

Medical Errors:

National Public Radio’s Morning Edition recently reported on a Johns Hopkins University study that found medical errors are the third-leading cause of death in the US, right after cancer and heart disease. The NPR report later states, “…the study estimates that more than 250,000 Americans die each year from medical errors.”

Yet Prop 106 would give two doctors, any two doctors, the license to say that someone has only six months to live and can commit suicide.

Doctors make mistakes. We all know this. Should we really vote for a policy that could lead to more forever-fatal mistakes?

Be a skeptic – look hard at the facts about Prop 106. Think for yourself.

No Mental Health Exam:

Prop 106 says that to qualify for assisted suicide, one must be of sound mind to make that decision.

Yet, curiously, there is no requirement that any trained psychiatrist or licensed psychologist be in the loop. Instead, just any doctor gets to decide.

Ask yourself, should someone who mainly treats bunions or earaches be allowed to assess the mental health of a seriously ill patient?

There are a lot of bad ideas out there, but this one is really bad. It’s okay to just say NO.

Be a skeptic – think clearly and objectively about Prop 106 and whether it’s the best we can do for Colorado. Think for yourself.

Consult a specialist?

If you were facing a life-threatening disease, you’d want to consult the finest doctor you could see, almost assuredly a specialist. But Proposal 106 does JUST THE OPPOSITE. If you face a potentially life-ending disease, it allows you to choose suicide on the basis of the opinion of any old doctor, even one that has no experience with your disease or illness.

If we are going to allow someone to take their life, shouldn’t we at least be sure that a specialist is consulted, if only to ensure that no error is made in diagnosis or potential treatments.

Be a skeptic – Look closely at Prop 106 and decide whether it’s the best for all. Think for yourself.

Denver Post - No on Proposition 106: Assisted suicide measure lacks proper safeguards.

Alex Schadenberg

Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Denver Post published an editorial on October 12 opposing Proposition 106, the Colorado proposition to legalize assisted suicide through a ballot initiative this November. The Denver Post wrote:

After a lot of soul-searching, we are asking voters to reject Proposition 106, a measure that would give patients the legal right to end their life, because we fear the cultural, legal and medical shift that it would create in Colorado. 

Those facing their final months are in a vulnerable place, a time when an individual is susceptible to pressures both subtle and overt, susceptible to self-imposed guilt over burdening family and worries about spending hard-earned savings on care. Such patients also are susceptible to depression and its dark influences on decision-making.

It is important to note that in the past The Denver Post supported assisted suicide but they are not supporting Proposition 106 because the safeguards are inadequate:

The Denver Post editorial board has in the past supported proposed legislation that would have allowed doctors to prescribe life-ending drugs to patients with six months or less to live. We came down on the side of personal liberty before the bill failed in 2015. 

But we worry the present measure fails to include reporting requirements in place in an Oregon law that Colorado’s initiative draws from, and that Proposition 106 would entice insurers to drop expensive treatments for terminal patients even when medical advances might add months or years more to a life that a patient may wish to take. 

Already doctors struggle to discuss end-of-life options like quitting treatment and going into hospice, or programs designed to control pain and suffering instead of trying to cure underlying illnesses. Under Proposition 106, the burden of counseling patients about suicide rests on the shoulders of the doctor who would be prescribing the fatal drug. 

We don’t have unfettered faith in all doctors’ ability to handle that responsibility. 

There are safeguards in place to guard against overt pressures. Two doctors must confirm the terminal diagnosis, attest to the patient’s soundness of mind and hear two verbal requests and witness one written request for the fatal drugs. 

In Oregon, where an aid-in-dying law has been legal for 19 years, 1,545 people have been prescribed the drugs and 991 patients have died from ingesting them. The Oregon Health Authority is required to track basic statistics about those who die, but the agency also surveys physicians who prescribed life-ending drugs about the patients after they have ingested the drug. 

The Oregon studies show that historically only 22.6 percent of those who committed suicide listed “inadequate pain control or concern about it” as a primary end-of-life concern. But almost 91 percent said losing autonomy was a concern; 88 percent said being less able to engage in activities making life enjoyable; and 83 percent said a loss of dignity. Doctors were able to select multiple end-of-life concerns per patient. 

We worry that the top reasons physicians give for a patient ending a life are easily influenced by those around them and by the care they receive in their final days.
Also concerning is that there is no requirement in the proposition to report or track Colorado’s program like there is in Oregon. So what little we do know about the experience in Oregon would not be known in Colorado. 

In the end, despite our desire to support an individual’s right to make this decision, we cannot support a law that would so easily open an irreversible door.

Thank you to the Denver Post for honestly assessing Proposition 106 and rejecting the assisted suicide ballot initiative.

Adventist Health will not participate in California assisted suicide act.

Alex Schadenberg
International Chair - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Adventist Health has decided to not participate in assisted suicide since the assisted suicide law came into effect on June 9 in California. Adventist Health recently released the following statement:

The recent passage of California’s End of Life Option Act has raised many questions for physicians, hospitals, pharmacists, social workers and others. 

After careful consideration, Adventist Health has chosen not to participate under the “death with dignity” legislation in California, or in any of the other states in which the health system has operations. This means that no Adventist Health employees, independent contractors, or other persons or entities may participate in activities under any death with dignity law while on the premises of an Adventist Health facility, or while acting within the scope of any employment or contractual relationship with Adventist Health. If a patient requests assistance under a death with dignity law, a referral may be provided. 

In keeping with our mission, we believe our providers have an obligation to openly discuss the patient's concerns, unmet needs, feeling and desires about the dying process. Our goal is to help our providers pursue the underlying causes regarding the patient's questions and help the patient understand the range of available options, including comfort care, hospice care and pain control. We encourage all providers to respond to a patient's query about life-ending medication with openness and compassion. Ultimately, our goal is to help patients make informed decisions about end-of-life care.

Thank you to Adventist Health for protecting patients from assisted suicide. The only response to assisted suicide is total non-cooperation.

Euthanasia Symposium 2016 - October 29, 2016 - Resisting euthanasia and assisted suicide.

The EPC 2016 Euthanasia Symposium is Saturday October 29, 2016 at the Best Western Waterfront Hotel - 277 Riverside Rd West Windsor Ontario (next to the Windsor/Detroit tunnel). Book your hotel room for $139 by calling the Best Western at: 519-973-5555.

The Symposium runs from 9 am to 5 pm and  is followed by a dinner at 6 pm to honor Jean Echlin, our President.

The Symposium registration is $50. 

The cost to attend the dinner is $50. 

The cost to attend the Symposium and the dinner is $90.

Register for the Symposium and dinner by calling the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition at: 1-877-439-3348 or email: info@epcc.ca or register by paypal or credit card (link).

Download the registration form here: 2016 Euthanasia Symposium Order Form.

Jean Echlin
EPC President

The dinner to honor Jean Echlin, EPC President is at 6 pm at the Giovanni Caboto club - 2175 Parent Ave Windsor (Da Vinci room). Jean is a past director of the Hospice of Windsor, a past winner of the Dorothy Ley award for excellence in palliative care in Ontario and the founding VP of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

Speakers include:

• Catherine Glenn Foster - EPC USA director and lawyer. Catherine has submitted briefs in assisted suicide court cases throughout the US. 
• Nancy Elliott – Chair – EPC USA – Opposing assisted suicide. Talking points.
• Dr Kathy Pfaff Faculty of nursing, University of Windsor (Ethics and Conscience rights).
• Kevin Dunn (Dunn Media) The Euthanasia Deception - building a social movement.
• Diane Coleman – President, Not Dead Yet. A leading disability rights group world-wide.
• Amy Hasbrouck - Director and Founder of Toujours Vivant – Not Dead Yet.
• Aubert Martin - Director of Vivre dans la dignité in Québec.
• Alex Schadenberg Executive Director – Euthanasia Prevention Coalition. Resisting euthanasia and assisted suicide.

John Kelly’s Testimony Opposing New Jersey Assisted Suicide Bill A2451

This article was published on the Not Dead Yet website on September 6, 2016.

[Editor’s Note: John Kelly lived in New Jersey in his younger years and traveled back there to testify on October 6, 2016 in opposition to the latest assisted suicide bill, A2451. His oral testimony is below, and his full written testimony is here.]

Chair Burzichelli, Vice Chair Lagana, Members of the Committee:

John Kelly testifying in Connecticut.

My name is John Kelly, and I am the New England Regional Director for Not Dead Yet, the national disability rights group that has long opposed euthanasia and assisted suicide. I am also the director of Second Thoughts Massachusetts, Not Dead Yet’s Massachusetts affiliate.

We are concerned that this bill is before the Appropriations Committee. It suggests that cost-containment really is a major factor behind the push for assisted suicide laws. So when in the state of Oregon, Barbara Wagner and Randy Stroup received letters from Oregon Medicaid denying coverage for prescribed chemotherapy. The letters did, however, offer to cover the negligible cost of assisted suicide. Because assisted suicide will always be the cheapest treatment, its availability will inevitably affect medical decision-making. This will actually end up constraining choice.

A2451 threatens you, every single resident of New Jersey, because all of us are vulnerable to misdiagnosis. “Terminally ill” is defined as:

“Terminally ill” means that the patient is in the terminal stage of an irreversibly fatal illness, disease, or condition with a prognosis, based upon reasonable medical certainty, of a life expectancy of six months or less.”

When it comes to life and death, there is no such thing as “reasonable medical certainty.” Of the millions of misdiagnoses every year, many are terminal misdiagnoses. We know this because of the thousands of people who “graduate” from hospice each year. Every year in Oregon, people have lived longer than their six-month terminal diagnosis.

John Kelly with Amy Hasbrouck

Every year in New Jersey, it is estimated that 1/10 people over the age of 60 are abused, almost always by adult children and caregivers. Although “self administration” is touted as one of the key “safeguards”, in about half of Oregon program deaths, there is no evidence of consent or self-administration in the death. If the drugs were administered by others without consent, no one would know. The request form constitutes a virtual blanket of legal immunity covering all participants in the process.

Assisted suicide laws inevitably take the lives of innocent people through mistakes, coercion, and abuse. Please reject this bill.

Euthanasia Deception documentary issues warning about assisted dying through personal stories

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

CBC News Winnipeg reporter, Marianne Klowak published an interview with Kevin Dunn the co-producer of the Euthanasia Deception documentary. 

Dunn is in Winnipeg to attend two screenings of the Euthanasia Deception documentary.

Klowak reports in her CBC News interview:

Kevin Dunn went to Belgium, where assisted dying has been legal for 15 years. He wants Canadians to understand the full ramifications of what is means to say 'yes' to assisted dying. 

Although the numbers here may show the majority of people want this, I don't honestly believe they understand the full ramifications of what they are agreeing to. The most disturbing take away for me from travelling to Belgium is that people are asking for euthanasia and assisted dying and getting it at the first diagnosis of cancer or a malignant disease, 

In the documentary, medical and legal experts say there were tough stringent rules when Belgium first introduced the law but years later, they say more people are asking for assisted death and obtaining it for non-terminal illnesses. 

Dunn interviewed a university professor who said his mother was depressed, not terminally ill and was granted an assisted death without his knowledge. 

A father, Dunn also interviewed, said he was asked by a stranger on the street why he didn't opt for assisted death for his severely disabled daughter. Dunn pointed out people under the age of 18 can apply for assisted death in Belgium with the consent of their parents.

Kevin Dunn

Marianne Klowak writes that Dunn is convinced that people have not received both sides of the assisted dying issue:

Dunn says while the media has done an adequate job in documenting stories about people who opt to end their life, he says more homework has to be done on what is happening in other countries that have legalized assisted dying. 

Because we have to learn by history, other countries who have gone this path, and what happens to the survivors who are left behind after these decisions are made? Family members who are suffering because they didn't know about the decision. While one person's pain has ended, it has been transplanted to another generation,

Marianne Klowak reports that Kevin Dunn has been inundated with interviews concerning the documentary:

Dunn, a former Winnipegger, who now lives in Ontario, has been showing his film The Euthanasia Deception around the world and has had more than 200 requests for interviews. 

Dunn says since the documentary has been released, inquiries have been coming in from New Zealand, Australia Belgium ,Canada and the USA. Movie theaters, including one in Toronto, have requested screenings.

Almost 750 copies of the Euthanasia Deception documentary have been sold. 

Purchase the Euthanasia Deception documentary for: $30 for 1 DVD, $100 for 4 DVD's or $200 for 10 DVD's (purchase information). You can order the documentary by contacting the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition at: 1-877-439-3348 or email: info@epcc.ca or by downloading it at: www.vulnerablefilm.com (download link).

Oregon State Assisted Suicide Reports Substantiate Critics’ Concerns

The following article was written by Diane Coleman, a lawyer and President of the disability rights group - Not Dead Yet, and published on the Not Dead Yet website on October 4, 2016.

O

Diane Coleman

ne of the most frequently repeated claims by proponents of assisted suicide laws is that there is “no evidence or data” to support any claim that these laws are subject to abuse, and that there has not been “a single documented case of abuse or misuse” in the 18 reported years. These claims are demonstrably false.

Regarding documented cases, please refer to a compilation of individual cases and source materials pulled together by the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund entitled Oregon and Washington State Abuses and Complications. For an in-depth analysis of several cases by Dr. Herbert Hendin and Dr. Kathleen Foley, please read Physician-Assisted Suicide in Oregon: A Medical Perspective.

The focus of the discussion below is the Oregon Health Division data. These reports are based on forms filed with the state by the physicians who prescribe lethal doses and the pharmacies that dispense the drugs. As the early state reports admitted:

“As best we could determine, all participating physicians complied with the provisions of the Act. . . . Under reporting and noncompliance is thus difficult to assess because of possible repercussions for noncompliant physicians reporting to the division.”

Further emphasizing the serious limits on state oversight under the assisted suicide law, Oregon authorities also issued a release in 2005 clarifying that they have No authority to investigate Death with Dignity case.

Nevertheless, contrary to popular belief and despite these extreme limitations, the Oregon state reports substantiate some of the problems and concerns raised by opponents of assisted suicide bills.

Non-Terminal Disabled Individuals Are Receiving Lethal Prescription In Oregon

The Oregon Health Division assisted suicide reports show that non-terminal people receive lethal prescriptions every year.

The prescribing physicians’ reports to the state include the time between the request for assisted suicide and death for each person. However, the online state reports do not reveal how many people outlived the 180-day prediction. Instead, the reports give that year’s median and range of the number of days between the request for a lethal prescription and death. This is on page 7 of the 2015 annual report. In 2015, at least one person lived 517 days; across all years, the longest reported duration between the request for assisted suicide and death was 1009 days. In every year except the first year, the reported upper range is significantly longer than 180 days.

The definition of “terminal” in the statute only requires that the doctor predict that the person will die within six months. There is no requirement that the doctor consider the likely impact of medical treatment in terms of survival, since people have the right to refuse treatment. Unfortunately, while terminal predictions of some conditions, such as some cancers, are fairly well established, this is far less true six months out, as the bill provides, rather than one or two months before death, and is even less true for other diseases. Add the fact that many conditions will or may become terminal if certain medications or routine treatments are discontinued – e.g. insulin, blood thinners, pacemaker, CPAP – and “terminal” becomes a very murky concept.

The state report’s footnote about “other” conditions found eligible for assisted suicide has grown over the years, to include:

“. . . benign and uncertain neoplasms, other respiratory diseases, diseases of the nervous system (including multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease and Huntington’s disease), musculoskeletal and connective tissue diseases, cerebrovascular disease, other vascular diseases, diabetes mellitus, gastrointestinal diseases, and liver disease.”

Overall in 2015, 7%, or 68 individuals, had conditions classified as “other”. In addition, it should be noted that the attending physician who determines terminal status and prescribes lethal drugs is not required to be an expert in the disease condition involved, nor is there any information about physician specialties in the state reports.

The Only Certifiers of Non-Coercion And Capability Need Not Know the Person

Four people are required to certify that the person is not being coerced to sign the assisted suicide request form, and appears capable: the prescribing doctor, second-opinion doctor, and two witnesses.

In most cases, the prescribing doctor is a doctor referred by assisted suicide proponent organizations. (See, M. Golden,Why Assisted Suicide Must Not Be Legalized, section on “Doctor Shopping” and related citations). The Oregon state reports say that the median duration of the physician patient relationship is 12 weeks. Thus, lack of coercion is not usually determined by a physician with a longstanding relationship with the patient. This is significant in light of well-documented elder abuse-identification and reporting problems among professionals in a society where an estimated one in ten elders is abused, mostly by family and caregivers. (Lachs, et al., New England Journal of Medicine, Elder Abuse.)

The witnesses on the request form need not know the person either. One of them may be an heir (which would not be acceptable for witnessing a property will), but neither of them need actually know the person (the form says that if the person is not known to the witness, then the witness can confirm identity by checking the person’s ID).

So neither doctors nor witnesses need know the person well enough to certify that they are not being coerced.

No Evidence of Consent or Self-Administration At Time of Death

In about half the reported cases, the Oregon Health Division reports also state that no health care provider was present at the time of ingestion of the lethal drugs or at the time of death. Footnote six clarifies:

“A procedure revision was made mid‐year in 2010 to standardize reporting on the follow‐up questionnaire. The new procedure accepts information about time of death and circumstances surrounding death only when the physician or another health care provider is present at the time of death. This resulted in a larger number of unknowns beginning in 2010.”

While the only specific example mentioned is the “time of death,” other “circumstances surrounding death” include whether the lethal dose was self-administered and consensual at the time of death. Therefore, although “self administration” is touted as one of the key “safeguards”, in about half the cases, there is no evidence of consent or self-administration at the time of ingestion of the lethal drugs. If the drugs were, in some cases, administered by others without consent, no one would know. The request form constitutes a virtual blanket of legal immunity covering all participants in the process.

Pain Is Not the Issue, Unaddressed Disability Concerns Are
The top five reasons doctors give for their patients’ assisted suicide requests are not pain or fear of future pain, but psychological issues that are all-too-familiar to the disability community: “loss of autonomy” (92%), “less able to engage in activities” (90%), “loss of dignity” (79%), “losing control of bodily functions” (48%), and “burden on others” (41%).

These reasons for requesting assisted suicide pertain to disability and indicate that over 90% of the reported individuals, possibly as many as 100%, are disabled.

Three of these reasons (loss of autonomy, loss of dignity, feelings of being a burden) could be addressed by consumer-directed in-home long-term care services, but no disclosures about or provision of such services is required. Some of the reported reasons are clearly psycho-social and could be addressed by disability-competent professional and peer counselors, but this is not required either. Moreover, only 5.3% of patients who request assisted suicide were referred for a psychiatric or psychological evaluation, despite studies showing the prevalence of depression in such patients.

Basically, the law operates as though the reasons don’t matter, and nothing need be done to address them.

Conclusion

The Oregon assisted suicide data demonstrates that people who were not actually terminal received lethal prescriptions in all 18 reported years except the first, and that there is little or no substantive protection against coercion and abuse. Moreover, reasons for requesting assisted suicide that sound like a “cry for help” with disability-related concerns are apparently ignored. Thus, the data substantiates problems with the implementation of assisted suicide laws and validates the concern that the risks of mistake, coercion and abuse are too great. Well-informed legislators on both sides of the aisle should vote against assisted suicide bills.

Canadian Jewish News: Medical aid in dying is "madness."

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Michael Bouhadana (on right)

Dr Michael Bouhadana, who is a family practitioner and palliative and pain care consultant at the Jewish General Hospital in Montréal, as quoted in an article by Janice Arnold published in the Canadian Jewish News that at a national conference on aging, organized by the Jewish Federations of Canada, he said:

"requiring doctors to end the lives of patients who request it is “madness,” 

“A doctor’s job is to cure sometimes, relieve often, comfort always – kill never,”

Boudadana continued with his critique of the law that permits euthanasia:

No one knows how many JGH patients have undergone MAD or how many have done so elsewhere in the province, because the procedure is not being entered on death certificates as the cause, according to guidelines issued by the Collège des médecins du Québec. 

“Instead, you write the disease… This is a lie, because you provoked the death,”

Boudadana then stated that greater access to palliative care is needed:

Only 16 to 30 per cent of Canadians, depending on where they live, can get such care,

The average daily cost of keeping a patient in an acute-care hospital is $1,100. In a palliative care unit or hospice, it’s $770 and, if the care is provided at home, less than $100.

Boudadana said that in Québec, every acute-care hospital and long-term care facility is required to provide medical aid in dying, including the Jewish General Hospital. 

The case against euthanasia.

This article was written by Paul Russell and published by HOPE Australia on Oct 1, 2016

Paul Russell

Paul Russell is the director of HOPE Australia and the Vice Chair of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition - International.

Senior journalist and Editor-at Large for Australia's National Newspaper The Australian kicks back hard against what some of his journalistic colleagues have been positioning as the 'rising-tide' in favour of euthanasia.

Writing in The Weekend Australian Kelly's article: Legalise euthanasia and compassionate society dies too is a serious and thorough look at euthanasia in practice in the places where it has been made legal and leads Kelly to the conclusion, as his title suggests, that society is irrevocably damaged by the introduction of the practice of doctors killing people.

Paul Kelly

He opens with an emotive plea:

"If you love your parents, respect your children, care for your society and think compassionately about your world then it is time to open your heartens when a jurisdiction legalises killing or, as it is called, euthanasia."

That there is something of a renewed public interest in euthanasia in Australia at the moment cannot be denied. Partly because this month marks the 20th anniversary of the first euthanasia death under the short-lived Northern Territory law (the first of its kind anywhere in the world) and partly because some journalists have been beating up on the idea, creating something like a self-sustaining whirlwind in all forms of media.

Over these last 20 years, the arguments against euthanasia have not changed. What has changed is the effectiveness of palliative medicine in eliminating pain and suffering. Kelly correctly cautions, however, that 'this is a critical trend but cannot conceal the fact painful deaths still exist and become the main argument for legal change. But euthanasia should not be seen as a substitute for palliative care - that would be a medical and moral blunder."

Kelly's second point is to cite the developments in who gets euthanasia and the rise in the numbers in Belgium and Holland to conclude that, 'where euthanasia is legalised the record is clear - its availability generates rapid and ever expanding use and wider legal boundaries. Its rate and practice quickly exceeds the small number of cases based ont he original criteria of unacceptable pain.'

He makes his point by posing a series of questions which actually chronicle the progress of euthanasia in Belgium and Holland:

"If you sanction killing for end-of-life pain relief, how can you deny this right to people in pain who aren't dying? If you give this right to adults, how can you deny this right to children? If you give this right to people in physical pain, how can you deny this right to people with mental illness? If you give this right to people with mental illness, how can you deny this right to people who are exhausted with life?"

'Culture and values will change to justify the death process' says Kelly as he introduces to readers of The Australian to the story of Tom Mortier and the death of his mother. Kelly uses quotes from Belgian euthanasia supremo, Wim Distelmans to note some of his more outrageous comments that, frankly, raise no notable objection in his homeland.

Kelly quotes Mortier when responding to Distelmans' claim that giving a lethal injection is an act of 'unconditional love':

"I loved my Mother for more than 30 years and I wanted her to live; Dr Distelmans loved her so much - 'unconditionally' - that after a few brief consultations over six months he gave her a lethal injection."

Andrew Denton once commented to me about Tom Mortier's situation saying that, sad as it is, it was after all his mother's decision - it was her choice. No person who has read Tom's story could dismiss what happened so easily - unless they had an agenda. But Denton's words actually uncover one of the most significant changes that euthanasia laws create that, ultimately, become the driver for cultural drift and euthanasia expansion. Kelly writes:

"The trend and logic is unassailable; once legislated the principle of euthanasia is settled and the practice of euthanasia is widened, if not by law then by administrative laxity and de facto regulatory sanction. Of course, many euthanasia cases are never declared. 

"A 2012 report by the European Institute of Bioethics said: "Initially legalised under very strict conditions, euthanasia has greadually become a very normal and even ordinary act to which patients are deemed to have a right.(emphasis added) 

"Many advocates in Australia use the rights language. Once this takes hold, then holding back the tide is nearly impossible."

Denton and others are in denial of this reality; most likely because they realise the potency and the infallibility of the argument.

The 'rights' argument is also present in the questions posed by Kelly (and cited earlier in this article). It is the denial of human nature: "Experience in other jurisdictions leads to the unambiguous conclusion: the threshold event is the original legalising of euthanasia. After this there is only one debate - it is over when and how to expand the sanctioned killings."

Kelly is higly critical of the Victorian Parliamentary Report on end-of-life choices and cites the dissenting report by The Hon Daniel Melino MLC (Victoria) which, contrary to the style fo the main report, is written in a scholarly manner and is exceptionally well-referenced.

He calls the main reports assertions that a law could be written with 'robust eligibility criteria' and their denial of the 'slippery slope', heroic optimism:

"It is echoed on nation after nation, year after year. It testifies to the deepest humanist conviction that mankind and wise governments can introduce euthanasia regimes with the necessary legal safeguards and the necessary regulatory protections to manage the promotion of death to ensure only net gains for the social order. 

"It is surely extraordinary that people sceptical of the ability of governments to get trains running on time fool themselves into thinking they can confidently manage a regime that sanctions the termination of human life."

Kelly goes on to quote the new head of the Australian Medical Association (AMA), Dr Michael Gannon and Liz Callaghan from Palliative Care Australia, both of the opinion that euthanasia does not have a legitimate place in medicine and palliative medicine. Kelly also notes the push from within the AMA for that body to adopt what is known as a 'neutral' position on euthanasia, a tactic that has been tried in a number of jurisdictions and is liekly to fail once more in Australia.

The pro-euthanasia movement know that once the peak medical body 'goes neutral' it can no longer express an opinion either way. Would we want the AMA to adopt a neutral position on medicare or on government health policy? Not likely. They are the peak body whose members, charged with our care, know the reality far better than anyone else. We need them to express an opinion on all sorts of health-related matters, euthanasia being one.

Kelly closes by returning to a personal appeal to his reader:

"If we proceed then life will change, there will be a "slippery slope", your relationship with your doctor will be different, the vulnerable will have a reason to feel uneasy, the push to make euthanasia a right will be inevitable, the frail will feel obliged to volunteer and our values as a community will shift more quickly than you appreciate."

Dr Will Johnston: The case against physician-assisted dying. 

The Euthanasia Deception documentary.

The Euthanasia Deception Documentary is available by ordering the DVD at info@epcc.ca or downloading it online at www.vulnerablefilm.com

“A thought-provoking, emotionally-gripping film that will impact hearts and minds. It effectively dismantles the fallacies of euthanasia proponents’ appeals to compassion and autonomy.” 

- Richard Weikart, Professor of History at California State University, Stanislaus, Author of The Death of Humanity: And the Case for Life.

“Stunning documentary. No doubt this film will save lives and prevent the destruction of a large number of families." 

- Anne LeBlanc, Rochester, NY

There are two ways to view The Euthanasia Deception.

Purchase a DVD from the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition or View or download online at www.vulnerableflim.com

Purchase The Euthanasia Deception DVD for: $30 for 1 DVD, $100 for 4 DVD's or $200 for 10 DVD's (add HST to all orders).

Link to the trailer.

The Euthanasia Deception is also available to rent or purchase online at Vimeo On Demand. Detailed instructions: 

1. Go to the film’s Web site www.vulnerablefilm.com and click rent or download. 
2. Click "Rent or Download Here”. You will be directed to Vimeo On Demand. 
3. Scroll down and click on the version you wish: Canadian or International Version 
4. You will be asked to join Vimeo, a free service, with no obligation. 
5. You will be prompted to pay $3.00 CAD (or equivalent) for a 48 hour rental download or $30.00 to purchase a downloadable version of the film. Most credit cards or Paypal accepted.
6. Be sure to enter your email to receive updates. 
7. Enjoy the Euthanasia Deception documentary!

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition (EPC) in association with DunnMedia is pleased to announce the International release of The Euthanasia Deception, complete with interactive website and resource materials at: www.vulnerablefilm.com. 

The fifty-two minute documentary features powerful testimonies from Belgium and Canada, exposing the three main deceptions used by the assisted dying lobby:

• Euthanasia & assisted suicide are falsely promoted as compassion or mercy.
• Euthanasia & assisted suicide are falsely promoted as a form of autonomy. 
• The myth that safeguards can protect people is exposed. 

The Euthanasia Deception documentary is also available to be ordered with French subtitles.

The Euthanasia Deception features; 

• Professor Tom Mortier, a Belgian man whose depressed mother died by euthanasia,
• Dr Catherine Dopchie, a palliative physician in Belgium,
• Dr Benoit Beusselinck, a Belgian oncologist and palliative care doctor in Belgium,
• Carine Brochier, the co-ordinator of the European Institute of Bioethics in Belgium,
• Professor Etienne Montero, Dean of the Faculty of Law, Namur Belgium,
• Hendrik Reitsma's grand-dad died an assisted death with no request in the Netherlands,
• Kristina Hodgetts, a nurse speaks about her experience with assisted death in Canada,
• Lionel Roosemont, a Belgian man who is the father of a significantly disabled child,
• Amy Hasbrouck, a lawyer and a disability rights leader in Québec Canada,
• Mark Pickup, a disability rights activist and public speaker in Alberta Canada,
• Steven Passmore, a disability rights activist in Ontario Canada,
• Alex Schadenberg, Executive Director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

We are all vulnerable at different times in our lives. This documentary is a dire warning for Canada and the rest of the world.

Your donations to EPC enable us to continue our commitment to resisting the acceptance of euthanasia while providing jurisdictions with data to prevent its legalization.

Purchase The Euthanasia Deception by (paying $30 + HST by credit card or paypal) or order by email: info@epcc.ca or call toll free: 1-877-439-3348.

New Assisted Dying law claims unintended victims.

This article was written by Dr Will Johnston, a Vancouver physician, and published in the Huffington Post on September 28, 2016.

Will Johnston is a family physician and the chair of EPC-BC

The Carter decision to allow assisted suicide and euthanasia claimed that Canada could avoid abuses through careful guidelines and screening. Medically facilitated elder abuse by greedy relatives and medicalized suicide for the depressed -- a grim reality where this practice is legal -- were supposed to be avoidable, said the judge,because of a superior medical culture in Canada. The abuses of Belgium? Not for us.

Experience proves otherwise.

According to the new law, it will be five years before Canada's assisted suicide and euthanasia regime has to report back to the nation. Two stories offer reasons why that report will fail to reveal those depressed patients, far from death, who are steered to suicide by others and by their untreated mental illness.

A friend, herself dealing with advanced ovarian cancer, heard from a neighbour that his wife was going to get assisted suicide. The neighbour said they would be going to a doctor in Vancouver to get this done. This baffled my friend, who had seen the woman outside her home, gardening. The husband made other comments suggesting that his wife would be dead soon. She had heart trouble.

My friend tipped off her own nurse to get community services involved and the suicidal woman's depression began to be addressed by a nurse and social worker. This apparently able-bodied woman did not go to Vancouver right away -- but she had been invited, as soon became clear.

I will let my friend's words testify to the end of that story:

"A few days later the husband came over with a clipboard and a pen. He started by saying, "Damn government did not pass the bill." He asked me to sign a form -- that he needed two signatures for the doctor in Vancouver. He stated that none of their family and friends would sign. I almost passed out! 

Seriously. I told him I would not sign. He assumed that it was on religious grounds and I said no it was experiential. He said "OK, then I will ask your husband." I told him he had better not even bring it up! 

We went on a two-day visit to the grandsons and came back on June 7 (the designated day of the euthanasia) and his balcony was draped in black crepe. 

Several days later I bumped into him at the mailbox and he complained that none of the neighbours had given condolences even though he made it obvious that [his wife] had "passed." I asked him how he was and he said that his wife had a nice last day, that she liked the walk around the seawall. 

He also told me that he felt sorry for the poor doctor because she was so tired because she had so many euthanasias that day. He and the boyfriend are now residing together in a big new travel coach parked elsewhere in the same trailer park and the Mustang has become the vehicle of preference and he sold his house. No one talks to him..."

This appears to be medical homicide as a solution to depression, apparently facilitated by a husband with other interests.

Several weeks ago I was contacted by the wife of a young man with a neurological disease. The man had been assured by a euthanasia-performing doctor in Vancouver that he qualified for an assisted suicide. He was depressed and never ventured outdoors.

At the patient's invitation I visited him in his shared room in a dingy nursing home, a place once described to me as "a prison." He told me about his struggle to find a cure with massive doses of vitamins. He was less disabled than, for instance, Walter Lawrence, who works in Vancouver as an inspiring peer counsellor to spinal injury patients and others.

But this patient had lost hope for the future and felt his existence was meaningless and that death was the only solution. This death-focused tunnel vision defines a suicidal depression, and any able-bodied person would be given psychological help to relieve it. This disabled man, who was nowhere near dying, was instead killed by a Vancouver physician.

The physician's rationale for circumventing the law, reportedly given over the phone before she met or examined the patient, was that he could easily get bed sores and then die of infection, so that his death "was reasonably foreseeable."

What surprised his wife was "how easy" it was for her depressed, self-isolated husband to be killed under the new regime. What seems obvious is that the whole nature of this death is not going to be reported to the Minister of Health or the Minister of Justice -- there is no transparency to this system.

Five years from now, the mandatory report is going to be full of bland and self-justifying statistics presented by the very doctors who have done the killing. By sanitizing these medicalized suicides and homicides with the now-familiar euphemisms about "medical aid in dying," the uninvolved public will be reassured that nothing has gone wrong.

Canada has simply created a system which offers, and completes, suicide for people whose personalities, disabilities and personal situations put them at high risk for it. Well over a hundred real people have died in the few months since the old law was discarded. To complain that this was repeatedly predicted is to indulge in powerless understatement.

And next, we have the unfolding tragedy of palliative care. That medical specialty has always struggled to reassure fearful dying people that palliation has nothing to do with "mercy killing" and assisted suicide. Reluctant families have been truthfully promised that hospice nurses and doctors are not self-appointed angels of death.

Sadly, palliative care wards and hospices across Canada are, right now, in a hailstorm of administrative edicts to perform euthanasia inside their walls, in whispering range of those families and patients who had been promised a refuge of care.

Violating the principles and purposes of palliative care is in no way required by the new law. The thoughtless imposition of this radical shift needs to be halted. Hospital administrators can and must provide other locations for those few final minutes.

Our Minister of Health and her provincial colleagues would be wise to act quickly on this. The principles of suicide prevention have been betrayed. It is not inevitable that the principles of palliative care must be next.

Link to more articles by Dr Will Johnston.