Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Reporter, Marnie Cathcart, wrote a commentary on a recent study published in the American Journal of Transplantation on increasing trend of organ donation after euthanasia. Cathcart was published by the Epoch Times on January 17, 2023. Cathcart wrote:

Canadian patients who opt for euthanasia provide more transplant organs than any other country globally that allows physician-assisted suicide, according to the first international review of medical assistance in dying (MAID).

Patients in Canada who decide to end their lives with physician help also contributed to almost half of the world’s documented organ transplants occurring after euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

The New York Times published an opinion column by Ross Douthat on December 3, 2022 titled: What Euthanasia Has Done to Canada.

Douthat begins by writing about the pro-euthanasia ad by Simons, a Canadian fashion designer and retailer. The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition has been urging it’s supporters to boycott Simons. Douthat states:

For those communities and children, the video’s message is clear: They should believe in the holiness of euthanasia.

In recent years, Canada has established some of the world’s most permissive euthanasia laws, allowing adults to seek either physician-assisted suicide or direct euthanasia for many different forms of serious suffering, not just terminal disease.

“Clients are telling us they’re considering medically assisted death or suicide because they can’t live in grinding poverty anymore.”

Nicholls states that demand on the food bank has increased by 60% since the pandemic. She stated that in the past they served 19,000 people per year and they are now serving 30,000 people per year. She also said that the increase in the cost of food has led to a 30% increase in demand for the food bank this year.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

In September, France’s President Emmanuel Macron stated that he wants to legalize euthanasia. At that time an Associated Press article reported that Macron said in a written statement that a body composed of citizens will work on the issue in the coming months in coordination with health care workers, while local debates are to be organized in French regions.

On October 6, Martin Greenacre reported for Connection France that the consultation will begin on December 9. The article stated:

The consultation will begin on December 9, with a report due in March which will guide the government’s discussions.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

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

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

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

Lévesque explains the issue:

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

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Brennan Leffler and Marianne Dimain wrote an indepth research article that was published by Global News on October 8, 2022 titled: How poverty, not pain, is driving Canadians with disabilities to consider medically-assisted death.

Leffler and Dimain (writers) interview people with disabilities who are seeking a death by (MAiD) euthanasia and they examine the wider issue of why people with disabilities are requesting death by euthanasia.

The first person interviewed is Joannie Cowie (52) who lives in Windsor with her daughter, who is a University student who also has a disability. The writers state:

It’s an unmistakable message from the government: if you want to end your life, we’ll help you.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

61 per cent of Canadians — are unsure or don’t support MAiD for those waiting for care.

Canada’s euthanasia (MAiD) regime is the most permissive in the world, with the exception of child euthanasia. The recent W5 investigative report by Avis Favaro focuses on people who want to die by euthanasia for mental illness; the doctors who are willing to kill patients with mental illness; and those who recognize the serious problem with killing people by euthanasia for mental illness.

When Canada’s parliament passed Bill C-7 in March 2021 one of the expansions to the euthanasia law was it allowed euthanasia for mental illness alone, but the government established a two-year moratorium on euthanasia for mental illness in order to establish protocols around the killing.

Register for the free online Patient Advocacy Training Program on Thursday, November 10, 2022 at 7 pm.

Link to the poster and registration link.

Kathy Matusiak Costa

Learn how to be an effective patient advocate. Help family members, friends, elderly people and people with disabilities in your community receive the medical care that they need.

The program focuses on legal issues related to advocacy, patients rights, effective advocacy communication, advocacy at the doctor’s office, advocacy at the hospital or nursing home and issues related to dementia and other health concerns.

Alex Schadenberg

Free online training – Live on Zoom!

With Kathy Matusiak Costa, Executive Director of the Compassionate Community Care, and with Alex Schadenberg, Executive Director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Wesley Smith wrote an excellent article that was published on October 7 by National Review online concerning a 23-year-old Belgian woman with PTSD caused by an ISIS Terrorist attack, who died by euthanasia.

An article by Steve Warren that was published by CBNNews on October 10 further examines the story. Warren reported:

A young Belgian woman who survived the Islamic State terror attack in the Brussels airport in 2016 chose to end her own life after suffering from severe depression and PTSD for years following the incident.

Now Belgian prosecutors are investigating the case after receiving complaints from a local neurologist who told them the decision to euthanize Shanti De Corte, 23, “was made prematurely.”

This article was published by the Epoch Times on October 17, 2022

By Wesley Smith

Because of long transplant waiting lists, the bioethics and medical establishments are bent on increasing the source of organs. It has gotten so bad that some of the most influential policy advocates in bioethics now urge that doctors be allowed to do what was once considered unthinkable—kill would-be donors for their organs.

Harvesting vital organs from living patients is illegal under what is known as the “dead donor rule.” The DDR not only prevents removing livers, lungs, hearts, both kidneys, and the like from living people, but its corollary forbids killing patients for the purpose of obtaining them—even if they consent.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Tom Mortier

Those who follow the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition will remember the story of Tom Mortier whose mother Godelieva de Troyer died by euthanasia based on “untreatable depression” in Belgium in 2012. 

In November 2017 Mortier applied to the European Court of Human Rights and in January 2019, they agreed to hear the case. Mortier was arguing that his mother’s euthanasia death contravened Article 2 of the European Convention of Human Rights. Mortier was represented by Robert Clarke with Alliance Defending Freedom International (ADF).

On October 4, 2022, ADF announced that the European Court of Human Rights “ruled in favour of Tom Mortier, son of Godelieva de Troyer, who died by lethal injection in 2012, aged 64.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

A Lachine QC man who lives with quadriplegia is seeking death by euthanasia (MAiD) because of the failure of his home care service to provide his basic needs.

Angela MacKenzie reported for CTV News on September 29 that Jacques Comeau (66) has applied for euthanasia based on changes to his home-care service. MacKenzie stated that a month ago Comeau was not considering death by euthanasia but now CLSC Dorval-Lachine has changed their system of care. According to the report:

three times a week, orderlies appear to help him relieve his bowels.

For years, the service was performed by the same 10 to 15 people, who have become familiar with Comeau’s body and its specific needs.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Uruguay Lower House Health Committee passed a euthanasia bill on September 6. The bill still needs to be debated and voted-on by the whole Lower House. According to a Mercopress report:

The Health Committee of Uruguay’s Lower House has passed a bill approving euthanasia. The body is now to debate the issue in a plenary session, probably next month, it was reported in Montevideo.

The article suggests that the bill is restrictive but the language in the article indicates that the bill is actually very loose. The Mercopress articles states:

“Any person of legal age, psychically fit, who suffers from one or more chronic, incurable and irreversible pathologies or health conditions that seriously undermine their quality of life, causing them unbearable suffering, has the right to be euthanized at their request and through the procedure established in the present law, so that their death takes place in a painless, peaceful and respectful way to their dignity”

The phrase “suffers from one or more chronic, incurable and irreversible pathologies or health conditions that seriously undermine their quality of life” will specifically permit euthanasia for people with disabilities or other chronic conditions.

This article was published by Bioedge on September 6, 2022.

By Michael Cook, the editor of Mercatornet

As the cartoon above suggests, disability activists fear that euthanasia could become a cheaper option for medical care. In a position paper published by the Anscombe Bioethics Centre, in the UK, a Canadian expert in disability studies contends that “While the expansion of [euthanasia and assisted suicide] has been motivated by a desire to end suffering and respect autonomy, in doing so we have created significant risk to disabled persons in a world which largely sees their lives as less valuable, as ones of inevitable suffering and as not worth living.”

Gordon Friesen reponds to an article by Dr Douglas Heinrichs titled: The Case for Medical Aid in Dying (Part 3). Friesen is a disabled man who has closely followed the euthanasia debate and is now President of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

By Gordon Friesen

From the very beginning of the assisted suicide debate, the elephant in the room has always been the so-called “disability community”, because this very diverse group contains large numbers of people who would logically be eligible for MAID; many of whom have followed the question closely; who understand first-hand the reality of medical suffering; and who are, in an overwhelming majority, opposed to the legalization of assisted death.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Tristin Hopper wrote an insightful article that was published in the National Post on August 15 titled: Canada is getting comfortable with killing its disabled.

Roger Foley

Hopper focuses on several stories concerning people with disabilities who have been pressured to die or have died by euthanasia. Many of these people have disabilities and were also living in poverty.

Hopper writes about Roger Foley of London, Ontario, who did not ask for euthanasia but was urged to ask for it. Hopper writes:

This week, a feature by the Associated Press quoted secretly recorded audio from a London, Ont.

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

An article by Peter McLaren Kennedy for EuroWeekly stated:

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