Maclean's Magazine: Canada's New Home for Death Porn?

This article was published by Kelsi Sheren on April 8, 2025

Kelsi Sheren

By Kelsi Sheren

Yes, Yes they are.

Maclean's recent article advocating for the inclusion of individuals with mental disorders in Canada's Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) program isn't just controversial—it's dangerously unethical, manipulative, fundamentally dark and sinister.

Maclean’s is very quickly gaining a reputation for promoting death porn and suggesting that those suffering mental illnesses should have access to assisted dying. They are once again choosing to send a chilling message to it’s readers, which at this point I doubt are many. They implicitly suggests that lives affected by mental health conditions are less valuable, less deserving of intensive care, treatment, or societal compassion.

In the most recent article promoting and manipulating it’s readers is their attempt to frame suicide as a legitimate option for those struggling with mental health, when all this really shows is Maclean's constant attempt at devaluing the lives of the mentally ill, effectively promoting hopelessness rather than hope.

Imagine the devastating effect on a vulnerable individual reading that their life is considered disposable or irrecoverable by society. This undermines decades of work aimed at destigmatizing mental illness and reinforces dangerous stereotypes about mental health struggles being inherently hopeless. While reading there most recent article I couldn’t help but notice the add for “war amps” on their site, which makes me laugh a bit because people who aren’t perfect are exactly what this magazine is attempting to suggest are disposable.

This magazine continues to frame the argument that people with mental illness are “irremediable”. In the Maclean’s article the concept of "irremediable" mental illness is a wild one. This position is scientifically and ethically unsound. Mental illness, unlike terminal physical illness, is complex, dynamic, and subject to significant change and improvement over time.

Mental illnesses such as depression, PTSD, bipolar disorder, or schizophrenia can indeed be severe and debilitating. But the nature of these illnesses is often fluctuating, with many sufferers experiencing meaningful recovery after proper care, therapy, medication, lifestyle changes, and even innovative treatments like psychedelics.

To label someone’s mental condition as "irremediable" is both wildly misleading and irresponsible, but this magazine seems to have no soul and seems quite alright with removing the very hope necessary for recovery and invalidates the lived experiences of countless individual’s who have successfully recovered from severe mental health episodes.

As someone who has personally overcome suicidal thoughts and severe mental health struggles, I can affirm that recovery and healing are possible. At my lowest point, it felt impossible to see a way forward, but with appropriate support, therapy, community, plant medicine and determination, I found a path out of that darkness. But according to this article Maclean’s wrote, I would have been considered “irremediable” and If I had seen this story over the 10 years of struggling with my mental health, then I'm sure I would have lost hope too. They are contributing to the idea that there is nothing left to live for so why the fuck should we even try mentality.

The thing is my story isn't unique; countless others have walked similar journeys, reclaiming their lives and thriving beyond their struggles.

To advocate for MAID as an option for mental health conditions fundamentally denies stories like mine and many others, wrongly presenting death as an inevitable or acceptable outcome rather than encouraging genuine healing and recovery.

Expanding MAID to mental illness sets a dangerous and dark cliff people will easily jump off of once we remove the responsibility of being the person to take our own life. A lot of the reason people stop before they attempt suicide is the FEAR or pain and what death will feel like. MAID and the “Dr’s” that do this dangle the carrot like a prize, removing the burden from the person and offering an easy way out.

Initially positioned as compassion, this policy change quickly risks becoming a tool of coercion, especially for marginalized and economically vulnerable groups, something we are continuously seeing in Canada and will continue to see as our healthcare system and country crumble to the ground.

Individuals suffering from severe mental health issues also face compounded struggles—economic hardship, isolation, lack of family support, or chronic homelessness. Offering MAID to these individuals coerces vulnerable people into viewing suicide as a reasonable escape from systemic failures and insufficient social support.

This has never once been about compassionate care. It’s darker than that more sinister and the reality is, is that it’s an abandonment of society’s moral responsibility to provide robust and holistic support systems. MAID has becomes not a tool of autonomy but a grim solution offered by a liberal government who is unwilling to invest adequately in mental health care but will send hundreds of millions of dollars overseas, to support ANYONE BUT it’s citizen’s.

The role of psychiatrists and mental health practitioners is to preserve life, treat illness, and support recovery. Maclean’s advocacy fundamentally conflicts with these professional ethics. Asking mental health professionals to facilitate MAID turn’s healer’s into facilitators of death and we are essentially making all healthcare practitioners EXECUTIONERS. Trained killers, guns for hire and instead of using a gun which would be more humane in my opinion. We are giving them government funded-non FDA approved drugs to inject into the veins of the vulnerable victims of people that have been convinced that death is the only option by people DWD and Macleans.

This ethical dilemma isn't abstract. It poses real-world risks of eroding trust in mental health services. People are hesitating to seek help, fearing their mental health struggles might qualify them for assisted dying rather than compassionate treatment, and we are seeing this time and time again. This scenario undermines the very fabric of mental health care, turning hospitals and therapists’ offices from sanctuaries of healing into environments potentially perceived as threats.

Beneath the surface, this debate is marred by an alarming economic incentive. Promoting MAID as an acceptable choice for mental illness is conveniently become a cost-saving measure for overwhelmed healthcare systems and governmental budgets by the liberal government.

Providing comprehensive mental health support, including therapy, long-term care, psychiatric assistance, and social programs, requires substantial investment, an investment the Canadian government is unwilling to make. Although they seem to have no issue making that investment on illegal immigrants who don’t pay taxes, lining the CBC’s pockets, and helping any country besides it own. MAID, by contrast, is inexpensive and expedient. Allowing individuals struggling with mental illness to access MAID has become a financially attractive alternative to addressing underlying systemic and societal shortcomings.

This hidden economic agenda is morally reprehensible, sacrificing human dignity and life at the altar of fiscal expediency, but at this point no one is surprised.

The language used in Maclean’s and similar articles often subtly manipulates public opinion, masking a morally and ethically complex issue behind words like "compassion," "dignity," and "choice." But true compassion would emphasize support, care, and recovery—not present suicide as a rational option.

Macleans is no longer rational journalism and frankly hasn’t been for some time. It’s now bought and paid for suicide porn for the sick, unwell and sad.

Dutch ethicist urges France to learn from the Dutch experience and reject euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

While a law on "assisted dying" will be debated in the French National Assembly starting May 12, a Dutch academic expresses his doubts about the continued expansion of the scope of its application in the Netherlands.

Professor Theo Boer

Theo Boer is a professor of health ethics at the University of Groningen, and a former member of a Netherlands government euthanasia oversight committee. Boer wrote a profound article that was published by Le Monde on April 8, 2025 urging France to learn from the Dutch by not legalizing euthanasia. (The text was google translated).

Boer begins by outlining the current situation in the Netherlands:

For more than twenty years, the Netherlands has been experimenting with euthanasia within a framework presented as strict, regulated, and ethical. However, the figures published in the latest report of the review committee, dated March 24, tell a different story of constant expansion, gradual trivialization, and a silent cultural shift. In 2024, the number of euthanasia cases increased by another 10%. One might have thought that the phenomenon would reach a plateau, especially after modest growth of 4% in 2023. This is not the case. The trend is picking up again, and the committee's chairman, Jeroen Recourt, predicts that the curve will continue to rise in the years to come. This is no longer a fluctuation: it is a structural trend.

Boer outlines the trends in the law:

It might be argued that this increase follows the aging of the population. But even as a proportion of overall deaths, the phenomenon continues to grow: from 5.4% of deaths in 2023 to 5.8% in 2024. In 2017, in some regions, this percentage had already reached 15%, and it is expected to have increased since then. Euthanasia is no longer exceptional: in many cases, it is becoming just another end-of-life option. But beyond the raw statistics, other developments are causing deep concern. The emergence of "euthanasia for two," which allows couples or siblings to die together, is one such trend. In one year, the number of these planned deaths in tandem has jumped by 64%, reaching 108 deaths in 2024. Above all, euthanasia for psychiatric disorders has increased by 59%, affecting people who are sometimes very young. Patients who are physically healthy, but plunged into mental suffering that medicine struggles to alleviate, are now asking to die – and are succeeding. The number of cases related to dementia is also increasing rapidly. Here, a request for euthanasia is often based on fears of dependency, a loss of dignity, or on a living will signed well before the first symptoms. We are entering a field where the patient's current wishes are sometimes unclear, and the medical procedure is based on interpretations. In my conversations with many Dutch doctors, one constant theme emerges: the pressure is increasing. It's no longer just an individual demand, but a social expectation. With increasing "normality," healthcare workers are asking themselves: "How far will we go? At what point will this stop being an act of compassion and become an automatic response to patients who refuse to accept a refusal?" For good reason, the government has now launched an investigation into the reasons for this increase.

Boer explains that the government continues to debate further expansions of euthanasia.

And yet, in the face of these doubts, the legislative movement continues. The Dutch Parliament will soon consider a bill to grant assisted suicide to anyone over the age of 74, even in the absence of serious illness. The sole criterion would be age. A major symbolic shift: we no longer die because we suffer, but because we feel we have lived enough. It's a radically new vision of old age and the value we place on our society.

As a former member of a euthanasia review committee, I believed, at the time, that a rigorous framework could prevent abuses: I'm no longer so sure. What I see is that each opening of the euthanasia field creates new expectations, new demands and a new normal. The internal logic of the system always pushes for expansion. Suffering deemed "unbearable" today is sometimes less so than that of yesterday, but the outcome remains the same.

Boer ends the article by urging France to reject euthanasia:

In France, some insist that "France is not Holland," and that these developments will not occur there. This is a risky bet because, in all countries where euthanasia or assisted suicide have been legalized, we observe a continuous growth in the number of cases. This is not a Dutch exception. This is a dynamic at work everywhere medically induced death becomes an option. I am not a fierce opponent of euthanasia. In certain extreme cases, it can be a last resort. But I am convinced that its legalization does not calm society: it worries it, transforms it, and weakens it. It changes our relationship to vulnerability, to old age, to dependency. It introduces the idea that certain lives, under certain conditions, are no longer worth living—or even worth caring for. I address the French here, not to lecture, but to share my country's experience. Look at what's happening in our country. Listen to the voices, however quiet, of those who doubt. Before opening that door, ask yourself a simple but fundamental question: are we ready for killing to become a medical option among others, even in the presence of cutting-edge palliative care, and even in the absence of illness? Are we ready to burden caregivers with the burden of such a choice? Learn from our experience. There is still time.

Previous articles by Professor Theo Boer:

• British must learn from the Netherlands experience with assisted dying (Link). 
• British proposed assisted death criteria are similar to how Canada's law began (Link). 
• Euthanasia: Impossible to police once legal (Link). 
• Let's not romanticize the Dutch euthanasia experiment (Link). 
• Be careful what you wish for when you legalize active killing (Link).

Nevada Governor says he will veto assisted suicide bill.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Governor Joe Lombardo

I have great news.

Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo said that he will veto assisted suicide Bill AB346 and he told the legislature to disregard the assisted suicide bill. Lombardo stated on April 4, 2025 that:

Expansions in palliative care services and continued improvements in advanced pain management make the end-of-life provisions in AB346 unnecessary, and I would encourage you the 2025 Legislature to disregard AB346 because I will not sign it.

Based on Lombardo's comment, The Nevada Globe wrote on April 4 that:

However, the ethical and practical ramifications of legalizing physician-assisted suicide cannot be overlooked. Critics contend that such legislation may lead to hasty decisions, undermine the sanctity of life, and pose risks to vulnerable populations, including the elderly and disabled. Furthermore, there is apprehension about the potential erosion of trust in the medical profession, whose primary mandate is to heal and preserve life.

As this debate unfolds, Nevadans are encouraged to reflect on the profound moral, ethical, and societal implications of AB 346. Should the state endorse a practice that fundamentally alters the physician’s role and the value placed on human life? Or should the focus remain on enhancing palliative care and supporting patients through their natural end-of-life journey? The answers to these questions will shape the future of healthcare and the ethical landscape of Nevada.

In June 2023, Governor Lomardo also vetoed assisted suicide Bill SB 239 that had passed in the Nevada Senate by a vote of 11 - 10 and in the Nevada House by a vote of 23 - 19. 

On June 5, 2023; Jessica Hill and Taylor R. Avery reported for the Las Vegas Review-Journal that Governor Lombardo stated, when he vetoed assisted suicide bill SB 239 that:

“End of life decisions are never easy,” Lombardo wrote in his veto message. “Individuals and family members must often come together to face many challenges — including deciding what is the best course of treatment for a loved one.”

Lombardo said the provisions in the bill “unnecessary” due to expansions and improvements in palliative care services, or care for people living with serious illnesses, and pain management.

*Please thank Governor Lombardo for rejecting assisted suicide Bill AB346 through (this link) or call him at: (775) 684-5670 or post a message through X (Twitter) at: @JosephMLombardo

Canada euthanasia reports: Rushing to Death

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Ontario Death Review Committee (MDRC) published two new reviews of Ontario MAiD (euthanasia) data between 2018 - 2023. The two MDRC reports focus on (Waivers of Final Consent), (Navigating Complex Issues Within Same Day and Next Day MAiD Provisions).

The first three MDRC reports (Report 3) (Report 2) (Report 1) were released in October 2024. I have included three articles about these reports.

• Article 1: Some euthanasia deaths are driven by homelessness, fear and isolation (Link).
• Article 2: Ontario Coroner's euthanasia report: Poor at risk of coercion (Link).
• Article 3: Ontario: At least 428 non-compliant euthanasia deaths (Link).

Dr Ramona Coelho

Dr Ramona Coelho, who is a member of the MDRC Committee wrote an article concerning two reports that was published by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute on April 7, 2025. Coehlo writes:

Canada legalized Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) in 2016, encompassing both euthanasia and assisted suicide. Initially limited to those nearing their natural death, eligibility expanded in 2021 to individuals with physical disabilities, with eligibility for individuals with mental illness in 2027. Parliamentary recommendations include MAiD for children. A recent federal consultation explored extending MAiD to those who lack capacity via advance directives, an approach Quebec has already adopted, despite its criminal status under federal law.

Despite its compassionate framing, investigative journalists and government reports reveal troubling patterns where inadequate exploration of reversible suffering – such as lack of access to medical treatments, poverty, loneliness, and feelings of being a burden – have driven Canadians to choose death. As described by our former Disability Inclusion Minister, Canada’s system at times makes it easier to access MAiD than to receive basic care like a wheelchair. With over 60,000 MAiD cases by the end of 2023, the evidence raises grave concerns about Canada’s MAiD regime.

Coelho writes about the scope of the MDRC reports:

I am a member of Ontario’s MAiD Death Review Committee (MDRC). Last year, the Chief Coroner released MDRC reports, and a new set of reports has just been published. The first report released by the Office of the Chief Coroner, Waivers of Final Consent, examines how individuals in Track 1 (reasonably foreseeable natural death) can sign waivers to have their lives ended even if they lose the capacity to consent by the scheduled date of MAiD. The second, Navigating Complex Issues within Same Day and Next Day MAiD Provisions, includes cases where MAiD was provided on the same day or the day after it was requested. These reports raise questions about whether proper assessments, thorough exploration of suffering, and informed consent were consistently practised by MAiD clinicians. While MDRC members hold diverse views, here is my take.

Coelho discusses: Rushing to death, Ignoring Reversible Causes of Suffering:

In the same-day or next-day MAiD report, Mrs. B, in her 80s, after complications from surgery, opted for palliative care, leading to discharge home. She later requested a MAiD assessment, but her assessor noted she preferred palliative care based on personal and religious values. The next day, her spouse, struggling with caregiver burnout, took her to the emergency department, but she was discharged home. When a request for hospice palliative care was denied, her spouse contacted the provincial MAiD coordination service for an urgent assessment. A new assessor deemed her eligible for MAiD, despite concerns from the first practitioner, who questioned the new assessor on the urgency, the sudden shift in patient perspective, and the influence of caregiver burnout. The initial assessor requested an opportunity for re-evaluation, but this was denied, with the second assessor deeming it urgent. That evening, a third MAiD practitioner was brought in, and Mrs. B underwent MAiD that night.

The focus should have been on ensuring adequate palliative care and support for Mrs. B and her spouse. Hospice and palliative care teams should have been urgently re-engaged, given the severity of the situation. Additionally, the MAiD provider expedited the process despite the first assessor’s and Mrs. B’s concerns without fully considering the impact of her spouse’s burnout.

The lack of adequate palliative care and the pressure from the spouse led to Mrs B's euthanasia death. Even though the first assessor indicated that Mrs B wanted palliative care, which reflected her personal values, she not only died by euthanasia, but her death was expedited.

Coelho assesses other factors.

The report also has worrying trends suggesting that local medical cultures—rather than patient choice—could be influencing rushed MAiD. Geographic clustering, particularly in Western Ontario, where same-day and next-day MAiD deaths occur most frequently, raises concerns that some MAiD providers may be predisposed to rapidly approve patients for quick death rather than ensuring patients have access to adequate care or exploring if suffering is remediable. This highlights a worrying trend where the speed of the MAiD provision is prioritized over patient-centered care and ethical safeguards.

Coelho points out how same-day or next-day deaths are more prominent in Western Ontario, she also suggests that the speed of death is being prioritized over the care of the patient.

Coelho then examines the issue of consent. Euthanasia was sold to Canadians as being for: Competent adults who freely choose and consent to the act. The Waivers of Final Consent report creates concern as to whether people. 

Coehlo focuses on two stories to outline her concerns about MAiD without Free and Informed Choice

Consent has been central to Canadians’ acceptance of the legalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide. However, some cases in these reports point to concerns already raised by clinicians: the lack of thorough capacity assessments and concerns that individuals may not have freely chosen MAiD.

In the waiver of final consent report, Mr. B, a man with Alzheimer’s, had been approved for MAiD with such a waiver. However, by the scheduled provision date, his spouse reported increased confusion. Upon arrival, the MAiD provider noted that Mr. B no longer recognized them and so chose not to engage him in discussion at all. Without any verbal interaction to determine his current wishes or understanding, Mr. B’s life was ended.

In the same-day or next-day MAiD report, Mr. C, diagnosed with metastatic cancer, initially expressed interest in MAiD but then experienced cognitive decline and became delirious. He was sedated for pain management. Despite the treating team confirming that capacity was no longer present, a MAiD practitioner arrived and withheld sedation, attempting to rouse him. It was documented that the patient mouthed “yes” and nodded and blinked in response to questions. Based on this interaction, the MAiD provider deemed the patient to have capacity. The MAiD practitioner then facilitated a virtual second assessment, and MAiD was administered.

Coehlo outlines how these cases do not ensure free choice nor informed consent.

These individuals were not given genuine opportunities to confirm whether they wished to die. Instead, their past wishes or inquiries were prioritized, raising concerns about ensuring free and informed consent for MAiD.  As early as 2020, the Chief Coroner of Ontario identified cases where patients received MAiD without well-documented capacity assessments, even though their medical records suggested they lacked capacity. Further, when Dr. Leonie Herx, past president of the Canadian Society of Palliative Medicine, testified before Parliament about MAiD frequently occurring without capacity, an MP dismissed her, advising Parliament to be cautious about considering seriously evidence under parliamentary immunities that amounted to malpractice allegations, which should be handled by the appropriate regulatory bodies or police.  These dismissive comments stand in stark contrast with the gravity of assessing financial capacity, and yet the magnitude is greater when ending life. By way of comparison, for my father, an Ontario-approved capacity expert conducted a rigorous evaluation before declaring him incapable of managing his finances. This included a lengthy interview, collateral history, and review of financial documents—yet no such rigorous capacity assessment is mandated for MAiD.

Coehlo concludes her article by asking - What is Compassion?

While the federal government has finished its consultation on advance directives for MAiD, experts warn against overlooking the complexities of choosing death based on hypothetical suffering and no lived experience to inform those choices. A substitute decision-maker has to interpret prior wishes, leading to guesswork and ethical dilemmas. These cases highlight how vulnerable individuals, having lost the capacity to consent, may be coerced or unduly influenced to die—whether through financial abuse, caregiver burnout, or other pressures—reminding us that the stakes are high – life and death, no less.

The fundamental expectation of health care should be to rush to care for the patient, providing support through a system that embraces them—not rush them toward death without efforts to mitigate suffering or ensure free and informed consent. If we truly value dignity, we must invest in comprehensive care to prevent patients from being administered speedy death in their most vulnerable moment, turning their worst day into potentially their last.

Some previous articles by Dr Ramona Coehlo:

• Canada Euthanasia – unmasking health care and social failures (Link)
• Discrimination driven deaths (Link).
• Heart-wrenching lessons from Canada's euthanasia regime (Link).
• Canadians with Disabilities are Needlessly dying by euthanasia (Link).

United Nations MAID report raises important issues

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Toronto Sun Editorial on Sunday April 6, 2025 concerned the UN Committee on the Rights of People with Disabilities report that urged the Canadian government to repeal Track 2 euthanasia (MAiD), including the planned 2027 expansion to persons whose “sole underlying medical condition is a mental illness,” and reject proposals to expand MAiD to “mature minors” and through advance requests.

Article: United Nations Committee directs Canada to repeal Track 2 euthanasia deaths (Link).

The Toronto Sun Editorial stated:

Medical Assistance In Dying (MAID) legislation for so-called “Track 2” patients — those people whose condition is not terminal and whose natural death cannot be reasonably seen as occurring in the foreseeable future. Track 2 is aimed mostly at the disabled. It has been criticized as a state-sanctioned escape hatch through which the government can offer MAID to those with disabilities instead of offering them the support they need to participate in society. The UN report suggests they have been failed by health care, housing and social services and are not receiving adequate welfare and mental health supports.

The Toronto Sun Editorial continues:

...When MAID was first introduced in 2016, it was seen as a humane way to help those who are terminally ill exit this world on their own terms, instead of prolonging their pain.

When “reasonably foreseeable” was taken out of the equation, it opened a can of worms that cannot easily be closed. The committee also proposed that the federal government not expand MAID eligibility, as planned in 2027, to those whose sole underlying condition is mental illness. It also called for a ban on a plan to allow advanced planning for MAID for those suffering from Alzheimer’s disease or dementia.

The Toronto Sun Editorial questions Track 2 deaths.

Assisted death is not just a personal issue for the person who has decided to end his or her life. It raises issues for those in the health-care system who provide that service. It asks us to examine what kind of a society we are when we consider disabled people to be inconvenient and disposable rather than provide them with support and care. Mental illness need not be a death sentence. It can be treated.

The Toronto Sun completed their Editorial by stating that: The next government must proceed with caution as it moves forward with MAID, but I suggest that the next government needs to do a complete review of Canada's euthanasia law.

A complete review of Canada's euthanasia law has never happened.

 

Unstoppable: Award Winning 2025 Documentary, Disposable Humanity Scores at 31st Slamdance Festival.

The following article was published by Not Dead Yet on March 24, 2025.

By Ian McIntosh
Interim Executive Director

Out of nearly two thousand entries, 146 films were selected for the 2025 Slamdance Film Festival in Los Angeles. Disposable Humanity captured the Audience Award and received an Honorable Mention for the Slamdance Unstoppable Feature Grand Jury Prize.

In Disposable Humanity, a profound, unforgettable documentary of historic disability injustice, Cameron Mitchell and his family guide the viewer down corridors of Nazi era eugenical horror into a past that many of us think we know but don’t.

Tim Stainton, Director of the University of British Columbia’s Institute for Inclusion and Citizenship once called Canada’s eugenical descent into assisted suicide and euthanasia, “the biggest existential threat to disabled people since the Nazi’s program in Germany in the 1930s”.

For anyone engaged in fighting health disparities and disability discrimination today, it becomes plain by the end of the film that the present-day creep of assisted suicide laws in America has an essential part of its ancestry rooted in the international ideas, language and maps of Aktion T4 – the Euthanasia Program of yesterday.

In vivid sequence, Disposable Humanity bears witness to the philosophical underpinnings of The Final Solution through a primary disability lens. This moving, living memorial reminds us that without the initial unchallenged idea that disabled lives are lives worth less than others, over 300,000 lives might have been saved, and the Holocaust might have been just an exercise in exile, rather than extermination.

Disposable Humanity is a production about, by and for people with disabilities and their families and friends and is essential viewing.

Spanish courts will consider a second case challenging euthanasia approval.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Laia Galiá reported for the Spanish ARA news on April 3, 2025 that a second challenge to a euthanasia approval will be heard by a Spanish Court.

On March 17, 2025 I reported that a Spanish court rejected an appeal by a father to prevent the euthanasia death of his 24-year-old paraplegic daughter. The article reported that the woman, known as Noelia, who was injured in a suicide attempt, was scheduled to die by euthanasia in August 2024 when her father achieved a court injunction to prevent the death. The March 17 decision stated that the woman met the conditions for euthanasia.

Galiá reported that the first decision (Noelia) has been appealed by the Prosecutor's Office and her father. The case has been referred to the High Court of Justice (TSJC)

In the second case (Francisco case) the Judge has determined that the family has the right to challenge the euthanasia approval. Galiá reported:

The High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) has issued its first ruling in the legal debate that in recent months has called into question the right to assisted dying. In the opinion of Catalonia's highest court, a patient's family may be entitled to bring a euthanasia procedure to court even if the applicant already has the approval of the committee of experts charged with studying and validating or rejecting these requests.

Unlike the first case, in the Francisco case it has only been determined that the father can challenge the euthanasia approval whereas in Noelia's case, a judge already decided that she met the requirements of the law. Galiá reported:

In contrast, in Francisco's case, the judge has so far only assessed the father's legitimacy to intercede, and the High Court of Justice (TSJC) is ordering her to assess all the evidence. In fact, the judges point out that their ruling does not imply that the family's requests must be accepted. They only rule, they say, on the parents' legitimacy to intervene judicially to request a halt to a euthanasia procedure.

The Spanish euthanasia law is similar to the Canadian euthanasia law since it only requires that a person has "a serious chronic and disabling illness."

Spain's euthanasia law should be challenged based on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Defining assisted suicide as medical treatment

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

I have been writing about euthanasia and assisted suicide for almost 30 years. During that time I have taken the clear position that killing is not caring and euthanasia and assisted suicide are not medical treatment.

The outcome related to defining medical treatment as including killing is substantial.

Dan Hitchens was published in compactmag.com on March 31, 2025 explaining: How assisted suicide will undo the NHS. The NHS refers to the National Health Service in the UK. Hitchens writes:

Last week, the MPs examining Britain’s assisted suicide bill voted through a very remarkable subclause. A single sentence, tabled by the bill’s chief architect Kim Leadbeater, quietly altered the definition of the National Health Service. The NHS’s original legislation in 1946 laid down that it must “secure improvement in the physical and mental health of the people of England…and the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of illness.” None of which really includes assisted suicide. If Leadbeater’s bill manages to pass its future votes in the Commons and Lords, this might have opened the government to a legal challenge.

I personally consider this change to the assisted suicide bill as revolutionary. Hitchens explains the significance of the amendment to the assisted suicide bill:

Hence the subclause, which allows the Health Secretary to declare that “commissioned VAD [voluntary assisted dying] services” are in fact part of the NHS’s legislative charter. The subclause doesn’t explain why: It just ensures that the government can say so. Which, as the Tory MP Danny Kruger observed, effectively admits that the National Health Service would turn into a different kind of institution. It would, through this tweak to its founding legislation, become the National Health and Assisted Suicide Service. But the alarm was loudest on the other side of the Commons. Labour MPs tend to regard the NHS as their party’s definitive achievement, the greatest edifice of the postwar welfare state built by Clement Attlee’s government. After the subclause went through, six Labour MPs signed a letter calling the bill “irredeemably flawed and not fit to become law,” noting—among a dozen other issues—that it makes “a change to the founding language and purpose of our NHS.”

Professor Sir Louis Appleby, who leads the National Suicide Prevention Strategy for England responded that they work on the principle that:

“Of protecting people at their lowest point, helping them find something worth living for, however bleak life looks.”

“Once the principle behind suicide prevention has been set aside, once any part of the ground has been ceded—not only to allow suicide but to assist it—we have lost something we may not get back.”

Hitchens explains that Kit Malthouse, a Tory MP argues that assisted suicide is not suicide. Hitchens makes reference to Australian MP Alex Greenwich who referred to assisted suicide as:

"an important form of suicide prevention.”

Hitchens explains that defining assisted suicide as part of medical treatment, with relation to the NHS will take the heart out of the NHS especially since Kim Leadbeater, the sponsor of the assisted suicide bill stated that trying to persuade a loved one from assisted suicide may qualify as “coercion.” Hitchens writes:

To recap: Taking your own life isn’t suicide, the provision of lethal drugs is suicide prevention, begging a loved one to stay alive is coercion, and the rejection of a safeguard “creates safeguards.” It is sometimes worth asking, in the words of WS Graham, what is the language using us for? This kind of language, this style of thought, uses us to obliterate what we thought we knew about our duties to each other.

Hitchens comments on how legalizing assisted suicide changes palliative care.

Palliative care, and more specifically hospice care for those nearing the end of life, is one of the signal achievements of modern medicine. Both in removing physical pain, and in addressing the complex emotional needs of the terminally ill, it can be transformative. But in jurisdictions with assisted suicide, it begins to hold a more brutal meaning. One Oregon nurse has lamented that “There is an attitude among many of our clients that ‘If I go into hospice, they’re going to kill me because that’s what a hospice does.’”

Hitchens continues by presenting data from a New Zealand study of healthcare professionals who work within a Hospice setting. The study by Dr Sinéad Donnelly indicates that the legalization of assisted death in New Zealand has changed the nature of hospice care. Hitchens comments on the change in attitude in New Zealand by writing:

Again, knock out the universal principle—we will care for you until the very end—and the atmosphere shifts decisively. There are two kinds of existences: those worth living, and those not worth living. A colder, more impatient, more utilitarian logic begins to work its way into our relationships.

Hitchens concludes his article by stating:

Stepping back a little, it is hard not to see a connection between the assisted suicide bill and the national condition in 2025: our crumbling public services, bewildered government, and extractive rentier economy. Hospices are struggling to stay open. The care sector survives on superhuman self-sacrifice and poverty wages (“a miracle sitting on top of a disgrace,” as one care manager has said.) Working-age parents are squeezed for every last penny and every last minute. There isn’t enough to go around—not enough cash, not enough time, not enough attention. And every one of those problems makes itself felt in the NHS, where waiting lists have hit record highs, 30 per cent of staff feel burnt out, and hospitals are so swamped that one hospital recently advertised for a “corridor care” doctor. Health and social care is perhaps the defining challenge for the current generation of politicians, and officially they all want to solve it. But wouldn’t it be easier, a voice seems to whisper, to just give up?

I believe that the problem goes further than described by Hitchens. When assisted suicide is considered to be medical treatment, the outcome is a requirement to inform everyone who may qualify for it based on the fact that people have a right to know about all medical options.

The reality is that assisted suicide is not medical treatment and in fact, it does not have a medical purpose. It does cause death, but death is not an intentional medical outcome, rather it is a reality of life.

Once assisted suicide is defined as a medical treatment, the legislation will be forced to expand. It becomes discriminatory to limit medical treatment to persons over the age of 18 and you cannot limit medical treatment to someone who is not dying, based on equality, when it can be offered to someone who is dying.

If euthanasia and assisted suicide are defined as medical treatment, then death becomes a treatment for conditions that require excellent care.

Assisted Suicide and Domestic Abuse.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

An article by Jess Asato (MP) and Cherryl Henry-Leach that was published by PoliticsHome concerns the UK Assisted Dying bill that is sponsored by Kim Leadbeater (MP) and the lack of protection, in the bill, for victims of Domestic Abuse.

Jess Asato is the Labour MP for Lowestoft and Cherryl Henry-Leach is CEO of the charity Standing Together Against Domestic Abuse (STADA). The writers explain their concern:

Jess Asato Labour MP

The bill as it stands does not adequately protect victims of domestic abuse. It needs more protections to prevent MPs from creating a new and legal way for perpetrators to abuse — and, ultimately, kill — their victims.

The Bill Committee did accept amendments that would require the medical practitioners and panel members involved in the assisted dying process to have undertaken training to help them identify domestic abuse. However, this does not go far enough, and the broader issue of how this bill will impact the lives of domestic abuse victims has been under-discussed.

Asato and Henry-Leach continue:

New data out this week from the National Police Chiefs Council shows that suicide following domestic abuse has overtaken homicide as the primary cause of domestic abuse-related deaths. We know from research by the women’s organisation The Other Half that 88 per cent of unlawful assisted suicides in the UK currently are perpetrated by men against women. These deaths are all too often romanticised as ‘mercy killings’, but given one woman is killed every week by their male partner and one in four women experience domestic abuse more generally, many of these suicides are likely in fact manifestations of abuse and control.

Asato and Henry-Leach explain that health care professionals often miss signs of domestic abuse:

We also know from years of working with Domestic Homicide Reviews that professionals across public services, particularly in health, often miss the signs of domestic abuse, sometimes with fatal consequences. Investment in policy and practice is needed urgently to resolve this. Research by Standing Together Against Domestic Abuse with Macmillan Cancer Support indicates that many domestic abuse survivors disclose their abuse in healthcare settings, yet these disclosures frequently go unrecognised or unacted upon by medical practitioners. Research from the Pathfinder project found that 80 per cent of women in violent relationships seek help from health services, usually from GPs, at least once, but the response is often inadequate, with many survivors not receiving the support they need, leaving them vulnerable to continued abuse.

The writers explain that assisted suicide enables abuse to lead to death:

This bill gives those most at-risk of abuse the means to end their lives, at a time when we do not have systems in place to identify their abuse and support them to live well. Older people, disabled people, severely ill people — these are some of the most vulnerable to abuse and coercive and controlling behaviour.

The writers conclude that:

We believe that one wrongful death is one death too many, but as this Bill progresses through Parliament, it is the responsibility of MPs to ensure that this Bill’s new assisted dying process leads to the fewest number of wrongful deaths possible.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition completely agree with Jess Asato (MP) and Cherryl Henry-Leach. They are correct that Domestic Abuse is more intensely carried out upon people when they are at the most vulnerable time of their life.

The founding Euthanasia Prevention Coalition VP, Jean Echlin, was a renowned palliative care nurse, but she was also a victim of domestic abuse. We have also written about elder abuse as it relates to euthanasia and assisted suicide.

The argument was clearly made by Asato and Henry-Leach and applies to every jurisdiction that is debating the legalization of euthanasia and/or assisted suicide.

Articles on similar topics:

• Homicide or Mercy Killing? (Link) 
• Euthanasia and assisted suicide - Ugly issue back again (Link). 
• A dance of death (Link).
  
• Death with Dignity or Obsenity? (Link).

Offered Assisted Death Instead of Surgery

Kelsi Sheren

Another horror story from inside Canada's Broken Healthcare System.

This article was published by Kelsi Sheren on April 2, 2025.

By Kelsi Sheren

Today I received a photo and post from a Dr friend of mine, who pointed out the most wild case of MAiD overreach I’ve seen in a while, and to be frank there has been several a day. This was what was stated "a Canadian citizen, injured in a workplace accident, was denied the surgery he needs and instead he was offered assisted dying (MAiD) by a healthcare practitioner and the system”.

When contacted by Alex Schadenberg, the Executive Director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition he stated:

“She (the doctor) didn’t push suicide on me. To clarify, I’ve been begging for surgery and they have denied me. If I ask for assisted suicide they have everything ready to go. That’s the point I’m trying to get across. I asked for these forms out of anger and got them immediately.”

Canada’s healthcare system is supposed to embody compassion, empathy, and healing—but right now, it's failing us in spectacular fashion. Let’s put yourself in this man’s shoes, picture yourself injured in a workplace accident, in pain, terrified, and desperately needing surgery, already knowing the system was broken but hopeful that at least you could see a Dr in the next 18-24 months. A bleak reality every tax paying Canadian is currently facing now in Canada. You reach out for help, trusting that your healthcare system will take care of you, only to be faced with an unthinkable offer: assisted death (MAID). That's not healthcare—it's a horror story. Sadly, this nightmare isn't hypothetical; it's a grim reality that's unfolding right here in Canada and has been for years. Sadly, mainstream media will never expose or challenge the disturbing expansion of this program and its underlying purpose: removing anyone considered a burden—injured workers, individuals battling mental illness, suffering children, the elderly, Indigenous communities, the homeless, and even our VETERANS.

This tragedy isn't just a one-off mistake; it highlights an alarming trend and reveals how severely our healthcare system has deteriorated. When bureaucratic cost-cutting measures, red tape, and institutional indifference become more important than saving human lives, we have truly lost our way, and I am aware that I’m not saying anything new here other than pointing out the very obvious. But MAID was sold to the public as a lie, it was supposed to be a compassionate choice available to people facing unbearable, incurable suffering—never a convenient alternative to providing actual medical care. Yet, it is now dangerously obvious that it has become a shortcut for a strained healthcare system drowning under financial and staffing pressures.

We must face some tough questions: How did things go this wrong? How have we allowed a healthcare system, designed to heal and comfort, to instead propose death as a viable option? This isn’t simply a flawed policy—it’s a moral disaster, a profound ethical collapse of epic proportions that should deeply shame us all.

Canadians deserve much better than this. We deserve transparency, honesty, and full accountability from those who manage and deliver our healthcare. Immediate reforms are not just necessary—they're absolutely critical. Our “leaders” and I use this term incredibly lose, policymakers, and healthcare providers must stand up and address this constant need to use death as the solution to all things and fix the systemic failures that have allowed something so horrific to occur.

The lives, dignity, and humanity of injured and suffering Canadians hang in the balance. We have a duty—a sacred obligation—to protect and fight for them. Offering death instead of proper medical care isn't just unacceptable; it's disgraceful and morally indefensible.

It’s high time we demand better, loudly and persistently, until meaningful changes are made.

No Canadian should ever be abandoned by the system mean't to heal them.

Quebec can tell us about the lack of social legitimacy for euthanasia and assisted suicide

Gordon Friesen

By Gordon Friesen

President: Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Peoples' eyes tend to glaze over at the sight of figures and statistics, so I will go directly to the bottom line:

Although Quebec has proportionally more assisted-suicide / euthanasia than any other jurisdiction in the world --including almost 10 times that of Oregon even after adjustment for wider eligibility criteria (see table 1)-- it still remains a decidedly marginal way to die. This is extremely significant. For just as we believe that euthanasia is wrong (and more is worse), so also, our adversaries believe that euthanasia is good (and more is better).

To be clear, these people are attempting to show that euthanasia is not only a "good death" but is actually the most desirable form of death for both the individual, and society. Their goal is to pragmatically prove this proposition by creating a perception, based on large numbers of people consenting to euthanasia, that this change in behavior represents some kind of inevitable social progress. And to that end, euthanasia doctors, administrators and politicians (especially in the Québec) are doing everything humanly possible to drive up consent rates as far as that may possibly be.

But that is precisely the insight we may now gain from statistics in that place: our adversaries are falling short, and failing in their plan. For there appears to be no medical circumstance, whatsoever (even under the most favorable marketing conditions imaginable) in which it might be termed statistically "normal" to consent to euthanasia. Indeed, when considered in the light of this data, no objective justification might ever be claimed for any particular case.

Most importantly, current Canadian public health policy cannot possibly be claimed as a reasonable response to spontaneous patient desire. On the contrary, the satisfaction of a marginal --and even arguably pathological-- demand for death has been used to undertake a complete transformation of public healthcare, without fundamental social legitimacy, towards a frankly death-based paradigm in which typical (non-suicidal) patients are increasingly unable to access real medical care. And yet, although we now suffer the full social cost of this institutional vandalism, the desired results have not been obtained!

Current policy is imposed from above, predatory in nature, and built upon a universal, State-mandated, systematic (and highly aggressive) marketing of death-as-cure. It's success depends upon the efficiency with which euthanasia may be sold to contextually helpless persons, by professionals who have learned to maximize the terrorizing diagnostic impact of serious illness, and to proactively reinforce any suicidal speculations born of depressive despair.

This dynamic is clearly illustrated in the official report of Quebec euthanasia most recently provided (2023-24) . Along the further banks of the St. Laurence River, far from both Montreal and Quebec City, we find two administrative regions on opposing shores. Both have the same traditions. Both watch the same TV; read the same papers; eat the same food; etc. On the South shore, (region 01, Bas-Saint-Laurent), the euthanasia ratio is an astonishing 10.6% of all deaths. Whereas across the water (region 09, Côte-Nord), the same ratio is below half of that, at 4.5%.

It would be difficult, I submit, to explain this difference in any other way than differing medical attitudes in their respective regional health administrations, resulting in turn from the personal bias of those doctors (and bureaucrats) working in each. Nor is this contrast unusual. Throughout rural Quebec, districts, literally side by side, show the same pattern of wildly differing euthanasia rates, split about equally, at or above versus well below the Provincial average.

There is no indication that patients are deprived of any valuable benefit in those regions with lower euthanasia prevalence. There is no population rising up with pitchforks, or crying out for release from "unbearable suffering". Lucidly considered, it would simply seem that at least half of all euthanasia deaths in the Côte-Nord (and other similar regions of Quebec) are not spontaneously requested at all, but "just happen", like those premature roof replacements, and encyclopedias, and vacuum cleaners --that no one really needs or wants-- but which are purchased, none the less, through the earnest eloquence of relentless door-to-door salesmen.

Certainly, knowledgeable patients might now have very rational misgivings about entering hospital at all, depending on where that hospital is located.

As noted above however, the more general problem --and regardless of where we happen to live --is that once institutional care teams are groomed to view euthanasia as the objectively indicated treatment for serious illness: very little appropriate life-affirming care is likely to remain for the vast majority of patients, who obstinately refuse to die.

Beyond political lobbying, therefore, our most important task, as advocates for life-affirming medical care, will be to create the conditions and institutions required to ensure that we, and our families, might have access to any such care at all. I am confident that, with growing citizen understanding of the true damage caused, the now developing medical model of euthanasia will eventually collapse under its own weight. However, that event may be decades away. Hence, we must not idly submit in the meantime.

This point is particularly timely in the US, because that country is not so far along the slope of State-mandated death-medicine as is Canada. There still remains a significant competitive element of patient choice. However, there should be no complacency on that score. Whatever advantage remains must be fully exploited by those with the vision and the courage to invent and create the structures required. There is no guarantee of future freedoms (just as there are now virtually no hospitals in Canada which are free of euthanasia practice). We are therefore urgently summoned to "use it or lose it!", right now, in the present moment.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition is fully committed to supporting all such initiatives.

A technical Post Scriptum for those who would like to see the proof

Facts, as they say, are stubborn things. And this fact (of politically structuring public healthcare to favor interests which are directly opposed to those of individual patients themselves) promises to be stubborn indeed. For how can social legitimacy be claimed for something so impactful, which so few people can be enticed to embrace?

I first made this argument in 2019 (in French), here and here and later in the Psychiatric Times (2022) and (2025). In each of these cases I used the worst examples then existing, which concerned cancer patients in the Netherlands. Approximately stated: 4% of all Dutch deaths were then due to euthanasia, while no less than 70% of euthanasia was performed on cancer patients. At the same time, only 30% of all deaths were due to cancer (including related euthanasia).

Doing the appropriate math (.7x.04/.3) we see that 9.3% of Dutch cancer patients died by euthanasia. I was thus able to demonstrate that in the most prolific euthanasia regime on the planet at that time, and in the most receptive patient category, less than 10% of patients would consent to die by euthanasia. Or conversely stated: 90% of such patients did NOT consent.

I also suggested that year-over-year growth of euthanasia was stabilizing, and that Dutch euthanasia would likely top out not far above 4%.

Unfortunately, these predictions have proved false, since the Dutch are now above 5%, but also largely irrelevant, since Quebec has now taken the lead with no less than 8.2% of all deaths (table 1). However, let us examine whether these new numbers actually contradict the underlying significance of our earlier conclusions before we assume that they have been discredited.

With rapidly rising incidence, euthanasia in Quebec has been metastasizing into other previously untouched patient groups. The proportion of such deaths associated with cancer has thus descended to 60%. At the same time cancer as a fraction of all deaths is now 26%. This means that the fraction of cancer patients who consent to euthanasia (.082x.60/.26) has now risen to nearly 19%.

Obviously, this is very different from before. Certainly, I can no longer claim that 90% of patients will never consent to euthanasia. However, if that claim is now "only" 80%, what essential difference is there in the meaning of those numbers? In fact, let us seek the greatest level of detail now available. It is stated in another recent Quebec report that certain specific cancers actually have a consent rate up to 25%. So be it.

Our revised claim may be stated as follows:

There is no medical circumstance, whatsoever, in which more than one quarter of patients will consent to die by euthanasia (even where that death is systematically promoted by the State and universally normalized by all care teams, in all medical facilities). Even in the face of such extraordinary psychological pressure, fully three quarters will refuse.

This I believe is the most important lesson which we may learn from data provided by the Province of Quebec. It is our interest and duty to ensure that medicine, public or private, be structured to serve the non-suicidal super-majority of patients. We must not allow clinical culture to be dictated by the cynical political exploitation of atypical views tragically espoused by a troubled few.

A note on misleading data concerning euthanasia for neurodegenerative diseases

It further appears in the above-cited report that up to 35% of deaths due to conditions such as Parkinson’s, ALS and MS, are now euthanasia deaths in Quebec. Please note, however, that this claim is extremely problematic. For people do not die of such diseases, they die with them. And thus any deaths so attributed will very likely be euthanasia deaths to begin with. Unlike cancer data, therefore, this statistic has no relation to the total number of people living with neurodegenerative diseases who might actually consent to euthanasia for that reason. Indeed, the fallacious suggestion made here, that voluntary death is so incredibly popular (and by implication appropriate) among such patients, constitutes a disturbing attack upon the physical and social security of people to whom we owe a completely different sort of respect and support.

Comparison of AD incidence in Oregon and Quebec

Assisted Death: 

Oregon 376 deaths (2024) (3) Québec 6058 deaths (2024) (1)

Total Deaths: 

Oregon 44,681 (2022) (5) Québec 79,300 (2023) (6)

Assisted deaths as a percentage of all deaths: 

Oregon 0.8%, Québec (7.6%).

1. Quebec End-of-Life Commission annual report (April 2023 - March 2024)
2. Quebec End-of-Life Commission five year review (April 2018 - March 2023)
3. Oregon Death with Dignity Act 2024 Data Summary  oregon.gov accessed April 2, 2025
4. Supplementary data from the Quebec End-of-Life Care Commission February 3, 2025  
5. Oregon total deaths (2022) oregon.gov accessed Nov.30. 2024
6. Total Quebec yearly deaths (2023-2024) statistica.com 
7. Fifth Annual Report on Medical Assistance in Dying in Canada , 2023, table 2.1a, www.canada.ca 

Elections have consequences. Vote for candidates who oppose further expansions to euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, 

Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Elections have consequences.

This is an important election for Canadians who oppose killing people.

Canada's 2023 euthanasia report stated that there were 15,343 reported euthanasia deaths representing 4.7% of all deaths. 

My research uncovering the 2024 Canadian euthanasia data indicates that there were approximately 16,500 reported euthanasia deaths. In Québec, the number of euthanasia deaths increased again. Québec has the highest euthanasia rate in the world.

The Office of the Chief Coroner of Ontario released a report from the Ontario MAiD Death review Committee indicating that there were at least 428 non-compliant Ontario euthanasia deaths from 2018 to 2023.

Recently, Canada's federal government was studying expanding euthanasia to advance requests, meaning, to permit people who state in an advance directive that they would want euthanasia, that the person could be killed if they become incompetent.

Canada's federal government has scheduled to allow euthanasia for mental illness (alone) beginning on March 17, 2027. A report by the Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying (AMAD) that was tabled in the House of Commons on February 15, 2023 called for an expansion of euthanasia to include children "mature minors" and patients with mental illnesses and that patients with dementia be permitted to make advance requests for euthanasia.

On March 21, 2025 the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Committee report urged Canada's federal government to:

Repeal Track 2 Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD), including the 2027 commencement of Track 2 MAiD for persons whose “sole underlying medical condition is a mental illness”;

Not support proposals for the expansion of MAiD to include “mature minors” and through advance requests;

Elections have consequences. 

I urge you vote for candidates or a government that will oppose further expansions to killing. 

We cannot afford another euthanasia expansionist government.