Remembering the 14,000 euthanasia deaths at the Pirna Sonnenstein T-4 killing centre

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Pirna-Sonnerstein

An article published by Diesachsen News on January 26, for the January 27 Holocaust Remembrance Day concerned the victims of euthanasia at Pirna-Sonnerstein, a T-4 killing centre during the second world war.

Dieschsen news reported that Saxony's Minister President Michael Kretschmer (CDU) called on people to be vigilant on the occasion of the day of remembrance for the victims of National Socialism. Kretschmer stated:

"We cannot undo history," he said today at the state's central commemoration ceremony in Pirna-Sonnenstein."But by remembering and mourning together, we can keep the memory of the victims alive and be vigilant against any trivialization of dictatorship and contempt for humanity."

Michael Kretschmer

With reference to the millions of people who died during the Holocaust and the 14,000 people who were killed by euthanasia at Pirna Sonnenstein, Kretschmer stated:

"There is no statute of limitations on this injustice," he said with a view to January 27, which is also the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz extermination camp. "The path to the extermination camps began with the contempt for sick people, with the judgment of people as worthy of life and unworthy of life." On Sonnenstein and in Großschweidnitz, too, sanatoriums were turned into places where human lives were systematically extinguished.

The article continued with the laying of wreaths.

Kretschmer, President of the State Parliament Alexander Dierks, several ministers and representatives of the diplomatic corps, the Jewish communities and the churches honored those murdered together with some descendants with a wreath-laying ceremony at the Pirna memorial site. Between 1940 and 1941, almost 14,000 people fell victim to the Nazis' "euthanasia" crimes at the "sanatorium", which was converted into a killing center at the time.

The day of remembrance reminds us to "do everything we can to ensure that the dark chapters of history are not repeated", said Minister of Culture Conrad Clemens (CDU). Keeping the memory alive is part of historical-political education and part of learning at school. In the late afternoon, a memorial concert was planned in Pirna's St. Mary's Church, where the New Jewish Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra would perform works by persecuted and ostracized composers.

January 27, the day on which Red Army units liberated the Auschwitz extermination camp in 1945, has been a nationwide day of remembrance for the victims of National Socialism since 1996 and is also the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust.

In May 2024, I visited the T-4 Killing centres in Grafeneck, Hartheim castle and Hadamar. I also visited the Berlin T-4 euthanasia memorial in Berlin in September 2023.

Links to more articles on this topic:

• The Hadamar T-4 euthanasia centre killed approximately 15,000 people (Link).
• The Hartheim castle T-4 euthanasia centre killed 30,000 people (Link).
• Grafeneck T-4 euthanasia complex killed more than 10,000 people (Link).
• Berlin memorial to the victims murdered by the T-4 Euthanasia Program (Link).
• Healthcare sector supported the Nazi euthanasia program (Link).
• Infant euthanasia. Is history repeating itself? (Link).

Assisted suicide laws, once legal, inevitably expand

Alex Schadenberg

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director,
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

When a jurisdiction is debating an assisted suicide bill, many organizations and individuals present information about the necessary safeguards that the jurisdiction must implement to “safely” legalize assisted suicide.

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition knows that it is not possible to “safely” legalize assisted suicide and once legal the law will inevitably expand.

Great Britain is currently debating an assisted suicide bill  sponsored by Kim Leadbeater. Many states have already introduced assisted suicide bills in 2025 and we anticipate many more legalization bills this year. We know that some states that have legalized assisted suicide will debate bills to expand their law.  

This article focuses on the experience with assisted suicide in jurisdictions where it is legal. 

Nearly every jurisdiction that has legalized assisted suicide, later expanded their law.

The assisted suicide lobby groups know that it is more difficult to legalize assisted suicide than it is to expand the law once it is legal.

On June 5, 2024 Colorado Governor Gary Polis signed Senate Bill 24-068 which expanded their state assisted suicide law by: allowing advanced practice registered nurses to approve and prescribe assisted suicide, reducing the waiting period from 15 days to 7 days, and allowing the doctor or advanced practise registered nurse to waive the waiting period if the person is deemed to be near to death (same day death).

In previous years other states expanded their assisted suicide laws.

In 2019 Oregon passed Bill SB 0579 which expanded their assisted suicide law by giving doctors the right to waive the 15 day waiting period when a person was deemed to be near to death.

In 2021 California passed Bill SB 380 which expanded their assisted suicide law by reducing the waiting period from 15 days to 48 hours. It forced doctors who oppose assisted suicide to be complicit in the act and it forced all medical institutions to post their policy on assisted suicide.

In 2022 Vermont expanded their assisted suicide law by removing the 48 hour waiting period, (allowing same day death), removing the requirement that an examination be done in person, (allowing approvals by telehealth), and it extended legal immunity to anyone who participates in the act.

In 2023 Washington State expanded their assisted suicide law by allowing advanced practice registered nurses to approve and prescribe lethal poison, by reducing the waiting period to 7 days and to force healthcare institutions and hospices to post their assisted suicide policies.

In 2023 Hawaii expanded their assisted suicide law by reducing the waiting period from 20 days to 5 days, by allowing the waiting period to be waived if the person is deemed to be near to death and by allowing advanced practice registered nurses to approve and prescribe lethal poison.  

In 2023 Oregon expanded their assisted suicide law by passing House Bill 2279 which removed their state assisted suicide residency requirement.

In 2023 Vermont also expanded their assisted suicide law by passing Senate Bill 26 which removed their state assisted suicide residency requirement.

Oregon and Vermont removed their assisted suicide residency requirements in response to legal challenges by Compassion & Choices, an assisted suicide lobby group. By removing the state residency requirement assisted suicide was expanded nationally because anyone in America can die by assisted suicide in Oregon and Vermont.

There is currently a lawsuit by Compassion & Choices challenging the New Jersey state assisted suicide residency requirement. On September 19, 2024, a US District Court Judge upheld New Jersey’s right to limit assisted suicide to state residents. This decision was appealed by Compassion & Choices on October 18, 2024.

It must be noted that Compassion & Choices support legislators' attempts to legalize assisted suicide, but once it is legal they soon go on the offensive to expand that law.  

This was also true in Canada, where euthanasia and assisted suicide were legalized in June 2016 (Bill C-14) and the law was expanded by Bill C-7 in March 2021 by (among other things) removing the terminal illness requirement, removing the 10-day reflection period, allowing euthanasia for incompetent people who were previously approved and allowing euthanasia for mental illness alone. The implantation of euthanasia for mental illness alone has been delayed until March 2027.

Groups that support euthanasia will state that Bill C-7 was related to the Truchon court decision in Quebec, but Bill C-7 expanded the law further than the Truchon required.

Push back to assisted suicide legal expansions in America.

In March 2022 a group of California doctors launched a court case designed to protect the conscience rights of medical professionals who oppose assisted suicide. In September 2022 US District Judge Fernando Aenlle-Rocha ruled that the California End of Life Options Act that had been amended by Bill SB 380, violated First Amendment rights of doctors by requiring them to participate in assisted suicide.

In April 2023, The United Spinal Association, Not Dead Yet, the Institute for Patients’ Rights, Communities Actively Living Independent and Free, Lonnie Van Hook and Ingrid Tischer launched a lawsuit to strike down the California assisted suicide law. The case asserts that the California assisted suicide law is a discriminatory scheme that contravenes the Americans with Disabilities Act. This case continues.

It is harder to legalize assisted suicide than to expand the law after it is legal. No new state assisted suicide law has become law in the past three years yet in that same time 5 states, that had legalized assisted suicide, expanded their law.

Expansion occurs for many reasons

When we examine the expansions of the American assisted suicide laws we recognize several key themes. There is the removal of waiting or reflection periods, allowing non-physicians to do the act, and allowing non-residents to die by assisted suicide.

Other expansions to assisted suicide laws include the redefinition of the language of the law.

In December 2017, Fabian Stahle, a Swedish researcher asked the Oregon Health Authority how they define terminal illness. Stahle learned that the Oregon Health Authority defined the six month terminal illness prognosis as including someone who would have a six month prognosis if they reject effective medical treatment. This was clearly an expansion of the law by redefining the language of the law.

A similar redefinition of the meaning of the law has occurred in the Netherlands. The Netherlands has never actually amended their law but they have changed the interpretation of the meaning of the law.

For instance, originally the Netherlands did not consider euthanasia for people with psychological conditions. In 2009, an interpretation of the law suggested that euthanasia for people with psychological conditions was possible. Since that time the number of deaths for psychological conditions has continuously expanded.

In Canada, most of the expansions to the MAiD law have been based on equality. The Truchon court case in Quebec was decided based on the concept that preventing MAiD for people who do not have an irremediable medical condition was discriminatory. Justice Baudouin decided that it was unconstitutional to deny some people MAiD based on the person not being terminally ill.

Once legal, expansion of the law is inevitable.

When a legislature debates an assisted suicide bill they will do so based on the language of the bill. They will argue that the bill before them is tightly worded with effective “safeguards” but even if this were true, most often a bill that is legalized is expanded a few years later.

Once assisted suicide is legal, restrictions on the law become discriminatory. For instance, it becomes unjust to force a person to wait to die, it becomes unjust to limit it to terminal illness, it becomes unjust to limit it to physical conditions, it becomes unjust to force people to have to self-administer.

Before legalization, everyone is equal under the law. Everyone is equally protected from being killed or equally protected from suicide. Once legal, people who “qualify” under the law are medically abandoned as they are told that they can have treatment or death. In other words, death becomes an alternative to treatment and care.

Legislators need to know that we oppose killing people. 

We don’t just oppose killing people who are terminally or chronically ill, but we oppose killing all people. 

Legislators need to know that we support caring for people and not abandoning them to death.

Substituting Death for Medical Care is an Economic Fraud Practiced at the Expense of Canadian Taxpayers

Gordon (parliamentary press gallery)

Gordon Friesen
President, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

It is no secret that Canadians, and especially young Canadians, are struggling to make ends meet. At the same time, Canada has some of the highest personal tax rates (and the smallest exemptions) in the world. The result is that many working people barely earn enough to survive. But they still pay a third of what they make to income tax, and (for the most part) pay 15% sales tax in spending whatever is left. Indeed, it is widely maintained, among young people, that there is no possible path towards a normal economic adult status, as that was defined even one generation ago.

The justification for this extreme taxation lies in the breadth of public services that government provides in Canada, as opposed to other jurisdictions such as the USA. Chief among those services is universal public healthcare, which accounts for 26% of all Federal (and 34% of all Provincial) government spending.

It is thus the Canadian healthcare regime which mainly explains both high taxation and acceptance of that taxation among the Canadian public. For Canadians are proud of their medical system. They are proud of the compassionate principle at its root. They are proud in the confidence of immediate care available in all circumstances. Among all government expenses, therefore, it is medical care for which taxpayers show the greatest tolerance, often affirming that they would be willing to pay even more... for higher standards of care.

What then may we say about an emerging public health policy in which death --in the form of euthanasia-- is to be routinely (and preferentially) substituted for the provision of any medical care at all?

What may we say about the suggestion of euthanasia for a worker who encounters a serious medical problem (as typically happens) towards the end of a long productive life, after that worker has paid thousands of hard-earned dollars every year for decades, in order to provide for precisely that event: for themselves, for their family and most generously also, for other less fortunate strangers whom they do not even know?

What can be said about the cynicism of proposing death as legitimate medical care, to that person, at that time?

Fraud. Theft. These are the words that come to mind.

Previous articles by Gordon Friesen (Articles Link).

Euthanasia doctor ordered to not kill Alberta woman

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition launched a petition demanding a review of Dr Ellen Wiebe's euthanasia practice (Article Link) (Petition Link).

An article by Mike Hager published in the Globe and Mail on January 16 states that Dr Wiebe has been ordered by the clinic, that she founded, to not kill the woman from Alberta that is believed to not qualify for MAiD in Canada. She has also been told that employees of the clinic will no longer act as witnesses for Dr Wiebe's euthanasia approvals. Hager reports:

The board chair of the non-profit society that runs the Willow Reproductive Health Centre also committed in an affidavit to ensuring that Dr. Ellen Wiebe would not use clinic facilities to end the life of an Alberta woman who had sought Dr. Wiebe’s help. The woman was denied the procedure hours before it was supposed to occur in October after her common-law husband secured a court injunction.

“The society will no longer permit its employees to act as a witness in respect for MAID being considered by Dr. Wiebe,” says the affidavit filed by Lisa Redekop earlier this week.

The Willow Clinic took action after a court injunction was granted to prevent Dr Wiebe from killing a woman from Alberta who allegedly did not have an "irremediable medical condition". Hager reported:

In granting the injunction last fall, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Simon Coval said the case raised serious questions about whether people are being properly assessed as eligible for MAID and whether the process is properly followed. Dr. Wiebe has established an international reputation for her advocacy and work with patients who want a medically assisted death.

The injunction was one of at least three lawsuits last year involving how MAID applications are approved and what rights family members have to intervene. Last month, Canada’s oldest civil-liberties organization, which led the push for MAID to be legalized a decade ago, called on Ottawa and the provinces to review and enforce appropriate safeguards.

The injunction application alleged that the Alberta woman, who reportedly has bipolar disorder and a condition known as akathisia – an intense uneasiness coupled with an inability to sit still that is linked to certain types of medication – could not get her own doctors to support her assisted death, so she searched online and found Dr. Wiebe.

The application alleged that Dr. Wiebe breached her statutory duty by approving MAID for a condition that does not qualify, while failing to review the patient’s medical history or conduct a full health assessment. The woman’s husband alleged that his wife couldn’t find a volunteer to witness her application, so a volunteer at the Willow clinic did so. The application also alleged that when the Alberta woman couldn’t find another doctor to provide the required approval, Dr. Wiebe found her one, connecting the two together for a second video-call assessment.

On October 29, Lisa Steacy reported for CTV news Vancouver that Justice Simon R. Coval signed an injunction on Saturday October 26 which prevented Dr Ellen Wiebe from killing an Alberta woman on Sunday October 27. Wiebe is known to be Canada's most active euthanasia doctor. Steacy wrote:

The injunction, signed by Justice Simon R. Coval, is the first of its kind issued in the province and was issued on Saturday, the day before the woman was scheduled to die.

It prevents Dr. Ellen Wiebe or any other doctor from “causing the death” of the 53-year-old woman “by MAID or any other means.” It followed a notice of civil claim alleging Wiebe negligently approved the procedure for a patient who does not legally qualify.

The injunction prevented Wiebe from killing the woman.

 The claim states that the woman is being actively treated by a physician and yet was approved for euthanasia by Dr Wiebe. Steacy continues:

“This case raises serious questions about whether (the woman) in fact qualifies for MAID Track 2. Particularly concerning is that akathisia appears to be a cluster of symptoms connected to the changes in usage of drugs used to treat a psychiatric condition. It is treatable but (the woman) has not followed treatment recommendations.”

The case alleges that Dr Wiebe did not fulfill the requirements of the law. Steacy explains: 

In addition to arguing that the woman was seeking MAID based on a condition that disqualifies her from receiving it, the lawsuit raises a number of concerns about the process by which MAID was approved in this case.

According to the court documents, the woman’s partner allegedly questioned whether akathisia is “irremediable” and questioned Wiebe’s willingness to sign off on the procedure during a Zoom call.

“(The partner) asked Dr. Wiebe if she had ever carried out MAID on someone with akathisia. Dr. Wiebe said that she had not. During the same Zoom session, (the partner) also attempted to describe (the woman) as a person with unresolved mental health problems which were probably not considered during the MAID assessment,” the notice of application says.

“Dr. Wiebe responded by stating that diagnosis does not matter, and that only quality of life mattered, and that this was (the woman’s) right.”

The lawsuit alleges that Wiebe did not directly speak to any of the woman’s doctors, did not request her medical records, and only reviewed partial records provided by the patient via email.

The case alleges that Wiebe did not consult or have a second independent physician sign off on the euthanasia application, and claims that there was not an independent witness who signed the euthanasia form. It also alleges that Wiebe arranged for a second doctor to speak to the woman and approve her death by Zoom.  Steacy explains:

“The litigation seeks to address potentially serious failings in the application of the MAID regime,” the court documents say, summarizing the arguments.

This case will potentially set precedent related to the approval system for euthanasia in Canada, how a determination is made when the applicant is not terminally ill, and may establish some possible oversight of the law, which is currently lacking.

Sign and share petition demanding a review of Dr Ellen Wiebe's euthanasia practice (Article Link) (Petition Link).

More articles related to this story:

• Vancouver man dies by euthanasia while on a psychiatric day pass (Link).
• Has Dr Wiebe killed people who did not qualify for euthanasia? (Link)
• BC Judge halts euthanasia death scheduled by Dr Wiebe (Link).
• Canadian doctor considers euthanasia the best work that she has done (Link).
• Does Canada's euthanasia law enable healthcare serial killing? (Link).

Register for our EPC zoom event: Australia's experience with euthanasia on Tuesday January 21.

Join the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and the Australian Care Alliance for a live Zoom presentation on Tuesday January 21 at 3 pm (Eastern Time).

Register for the Zoom presentation. (Registration Link).

Canada legalized euthanasia by amending the federal criminal code to create a national exception to homicide (murder).

Australia is similar to the United States whereby states that legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide do so by amending state laws. Therefore every Australian state has a different law.

Richard Egan with the Australian Care Alliance will join Alex Schadenberg to provide an update concerning what is happening with euthanasia and assisted suicide in Australia.

The Australian laws require scrutiny now that Britain is debating the legalization of assisted suicide. 

British politicians who support assisted suicide have become interested in Australia's experience since Canada's euthanasia (MAiD) law has become toxic based on the many negative stories and reports.

Register for the Zoom presentation. (Registration Link). Once you register, a confirmation email will be sent to you.

Thousands of Canadians dying on healthcare wait lists

When the number of Canadians who die while on a waiting list for treatment is combined with the number of euthanasia deaths, the number of deaths is overwhelming.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Dan died by euthanasia while waiting for treatment

Jane Stevenson was published in the Toronto Sun on January 15, 2025 reporting that at least 15,500 Canadians died between April 1, 2023 to March 31, 2024 while on a waiting list for healthcare according to data collected by SecondStreet.org through the Freedom to Information Act. Stevenson reported that:

However, SecondStreet.org says the exact number of 15,474 is incomplete as Quebec, Alberta, Newfoundland and Labrador don’t track the problem and Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia only provided data on patients who died while waiting for surgeries – not diagnostic scans.

SecondStreet.org says if it extrapolates the unknown data, then an estimated 28,077 patients died last year on health care waiting lists covering everything from cancer treatment and heart operations to cataract surgery and MRI scans.

On December 11, 2024, Canada's Ministry of Health released the Fifth Annual Report on Medical Assistance in Dying which indicated that there were 15,343 reported euthanasia deaths representing 4.7% of all deaths in 2023.

Since euthanasia was legalized in June 2016 until December 31, 2023 there have been at least 60,301 euthanasia deaths in Canada since legalization.

Stevenson reported that SecondStreet.org identified at least 74,677 Canadians who died while waiting for care between April 2018 and March 31, 2024.

Statistics Canada states that there were 326,571 Canadian deaths in 2023.

When the number of Canadians who die while on a waiting list for treatment is combined with the number of euthanasia deaths, the number of deaths is overwhelming. This data does not include deaths from medical error.

Some euthanasia deaths are connected to Canadians who "choose" to die by euthanasia because they have waited in a queue for treatment and give up.

For instance, a National Post story reported on December 5, 2023 that Dan Quayle died by euthanasia in Victoria BC while awaiting treatment:

Dan Quayle marked his 52nd birthday on Oct. 7 in Victoria General Hospital waiting to find out when chemotherapy would start for an aggressive form of esophageal cancer. He would die waiting.

After 10 weeks in hospital, Quayle, a gregarious grandfather who put on his best silly act for his two grandkids, was in so much pain, unable to eat or walk, he opted for a medically assisted death on Nov. 24. This was despite assurances from doctors that chemotherapy had the potential to prolong his life by a year.

There is also the story of Allison Ducluzeau reported by Amy Judd and Kylie Stanton for Global News on November 27.

Ducluzeau, diagnosed with abdominal cancer, was offered euthanasia rather than treatment. She was successfully treated in the USA.

New York assisted suicide bill is a bait and switch.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Tom Joyce recently reported for The Lion on January 15, 2025 that State Rep. Amy Paulin, D-New York, filed Assembly Bill A136, to legalize assisted suicide in New York. Paulin has continuously sponsored New York state assisted suicide bills since 2016.

In 2023 I referred to New York York state assisted suicide Bill A0995 as a trojan horse bill since Paulin "tightened" the bill to get it passed with the stated intention of expanding the assisted suicide law later. 

While listening to a video of a conference promoting the New York state assisted suicide bill, Assemblywoman Amy Paulin, stated (starting at 18:40) that:

No person can administer the medication to the patient. It has to be self-administered. 

We've been criticised by some organizations that actually want an expansion to that but we've held firm because... we want to get this passed first.

And then perhaps if other states who have had more experience feel that there needs to be an expansion, and I don't think they will because Oregon has been doing this for a long time, then they can come back to us, but at this point and time we have no interest in expanding beyond a self-administered dose.

In other words, Paulin was saying that her goal was to legalize assisted suicide in New York and then expand the bill later. The bill uses "bait and switch" tactics.

A similar statement was made by J.M. Sorrell, Executive Director of Massachusetts assisted suicide groups Death with Dignity, who stated on a similar bill that, 

“Once you get something passed, you can always work on amendments later.” 

The language of assisted suicide bills are part of a deliberate bait and switch tactic by assisted suicide advocates. They know that it is harder to pass an assisted suicide bill than to later expand a bill once it has been passed.

More articles on this topic:

• Nearly every state that has legalized assisted suicide has later expanded it's law (Link). 
• Retired doctor plead guilty to  manslaughter in New York assisted suicide death (Link).
• New York assisted suicide lobby members arrested for civil disobedience (Link).
  

British doctors want to raise the issue of assisted suicide with their patients.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Jessica Elgot who is the Deputy Political Editor with the Guardian reported on January 15 that: 

Doctors are preparing to speak out against changes to the proposed assisted dying law that could ban physicians from raising the procedures with patients." 

The British Medical Association which will urge the government committee that is studying the British assisted suicide bill, to permit doctors to introduce assisted suicide with their patients.

This is important because pro-death doctors will readily bring up the option of assisted suicide. Jurisdictions where only the patient can bring up assisted suicide and doctors cannot introduce it, have lower assisted suicide death rates.

Elgot reported:

The British Medical Association, which will give evidence to a committee of MPs scrutinising Kim Leadbeater’s private member’s bill, has said doctors must be allowed to raise assisted dying sensitively with patients if it becomes law.

The BMA said it would be “an unacceptable intrusion of legislation into the privacy of the consulting room”

The BMA’s official position is neutral on whether assisted dying should pass – but the union has agreed a collective position that doctors should not be put in the position where they are barred from raising it with patients.

Elgot also reported that at least 30 members of the British parliament who voted in support of assisted suicide at second reading have stated that they may oppose assisted suicide in the final vote if the bill allows doctors to raise the issue with their patients.

More information on the UK assisted suicide bill.

• Care Not Killing Alliance seeks submissions concerning the UK assisted suicide bill (Link).
• Assisted suicide is not the answer to the NHS financial crisis (Link).
• The British assisted suicide bill can be defeated (Link).
• The British parliament passes assisted suicide bill at second reading (Link).

Why is the UK Labour party putting assisted suicide ahead of social care?

This article was published by Spiked on January 14, 2025.

Elderly and disabled people need a national care service, not a national suicide service.

Kevin Yuill

By Kevin Yuill

The British government has announced a new commission that it hopes will build a ‘national consensus’ on social-care reform. Yet despite Labour’s talk of the ‘critical issues’ that face the social-care sector, the commission won’t deliver its first report until 2028, which is around the time of the next election. In other words, despite decades of debates, commissions and reports about social care, Keir Starmer and Co are kicking the can even further down the road. Plus, given the government’s already deep unpopularity, it may well be leaving the urgent problem of social care to whoever is next in power.

This offers an illuminating insight into Labour’s attitude towards the ill, elderly and disabled – particularly when contrasted with the government’s haste in legislating for assisted suicide. PM Starmer boasts an enormous parliamentary majority, and as a result has little trouble navigating the passage of bills. So why is Labour prioritising assisted suicide over social care?

After all, social care poses far fewer ethical concerns than assisted suicide. While MP Kim Leadbeater’s private members’ bill has already proven deeply controversial, a national consensus has long existed on the issue of social care. We all agree that care for elderly, ill and disabled people needs to be provided as widely as possible. The only real points of contention concern the amount of resources and public funds that should be allocated to this end, and how those funds should be raised.

The Leadbeater bill is far less straightforward. If it becomes law, it will fundamentally alter the UK’s moral terrain. By legalising ‘assisted dying’, it will transform the relationship between doctor and patient forever.

And this is far from the only problem with Leadbeater’s bill, which passed its second reading in the House of Commons back in November. Unlike assisted-suicide legislation in most other countries, the bill contains no conscientious-objection clause for doctors. In jurisdictions that have already legalised assisted suicide, only Canada, where euthanasia is now the fifth-leading cause of death, requires doctors to participate regardless of their views.

These details, and many others, bear thinking about – not least by our elected law-makers. But the assisted-dying bill was rushed through after just five hours of debate. Leadbeater herself betrayed a limited understanding of her own bill, and its implications, when she was arguing for it in parliament. MPs were given only 16 days to digest one of the longest private members’ bills in parliamentary history. What’s more, a committee stacked with assisted-suicide supporters and inexperienced MPs is now responsible for combing through the bill at break-neck speed.

The skewed priorities are grotesque. A third reading of Leadbeater’s shoddy legislation is already scheduled for April. Assisted suicide could be law by 2027, bringing in what Tory MP Danny Kruger has branded a ‘national suicide service’. Yet, at the same time, more than 10 and a half years after it was first proposed, a national care service looks no closer to becoming a reality.

It seems that this is a government keener on helping people to die than on ensuring they are cared for while they are still here. 

Kevin Yuill teaches American studies at the University of Sunderland. His book, Assisted Suicide: The Liberal, Humanist Case Against Legalisation, is published by Palgrave Macmillan.

True Compassion vs the Faux Compassion of Assisted Suicide

We need social policies based in genuine empathy, not the “MAiD” movement’s pseudo “empathy.” 

Meghan Schrader

By Meghan Schrader

Meghan is an autistic person who is an instructor at E4 - University of Texas (Austin) and an EPC-USA board member.

One of the things I love best about my job is that it connects me to a community of other disabled people. All of the students and many of the staff have disabilities, and our insight into one anothers struggles allows us to model interdependence-people with similar experiences helping each other live with dignity and make positive choices.

Our mutual experience of disability also helps us have empathy for each other. We understand how hard it can be to be disabled, especially in an ableist world, so we’re able to provide peer support if one of us is feeling overwhelmed and sad. 

For instance, a few months ago a student who is partially blind wept because she was struggling to read important information on a whiteboard, and she said, “It’s so hard to be disabled sometimes!” “I know, sweetie,” I said. “We at E4 want you to not be ashamed of your disability and maybe even take pride in it, but that doesn’t mean you have to like it all the time.” Another day a colleague with bipolar disorder asked, “Is there a bug on that wall? I hope I’m not hallucinating.” I responded: “I don’t see a bug, but maybe it was just a shadow.” That seemed to alleviate her anxiety. “Yeah, that makes sense,” she said. Another time a student with a chromosomal anomaly and severe anxiety was talking to me and this same colleague and said with tears in her eyes, “What am I going to do? How am I gonna live with my disability? How am I going to get a job?” We both assured her that we understood her fears, and pointed out that we both live on our own and have jobs, even though we are disabled, and that she has a solid vocational goal that she is working for. One night I arrived at work feeling overwhelmed and depressed about the long day I had had trying to cope with the deficits related to my learning disability, and feeling frustrated about that disability’s impact on my life in general. When there weren’t any students in the room tears trickled down my cheeks and I said to a different disabled colleague, “I love my job, but sometimes it’s so hard to live and work with my learning disability; I hate it sometimes; I really do!” “I understand, Meg,” he said gently. “Do you want me to get you a tissue?” I am deeply grateful for that mutual support among staff and students, which gives us all an opportunity to function at our highest potential.

What the assisted suicide movement does to the disabled community is like if instead of commiserating with one anothers suffering one of us had said to the other, “Yeah, you’re right; your life sucks and things will probably never get any better. Have you considered killing yourself?”

Why don’t proponents of assisted suicide, especially proponents of regimes like Canada’s, understand how cruel that is to do to someone? What is the point of reaching out for help in your lowest moments if the people you reach out to are just going to suggest that you die?

The interactions I’ve cited model true compassion; the assisted suicide movement does not. My colleagues, students and I lift each other up, the assisted suicide movement kicks disabled people when we are down. 

We need social policies based in genuine empathy, not the “MAiD” movement’s pseudo “empathy.”

Previous articles by Meghan Schrader - (Articles Link).