Category: Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide

The Demand for Death in Canada Grows: Guest Column

According to a recent article in The Atlantic, assisted suicide is now so popular in Canada that doctors cannot keep up with the demand. Appropriately titled Canada is Killing Itself, the article described how Medical Assistance in Dying (or MAiD), passed just 10 years ago, now accounts for about one in 20 deaths in Canada. That number is more than the total number of combined deaths from Alzheimer’s and diabetes, and it surpasses many countries where assisted dying has been legal for far longer. The shortage of “care” is not due to a lack of interest from medical professionals. Doctors are in fact flocking to join what the Atlantic article called “the world’s fastest-growing euthanasia regime.”  

For example, Dr. Stefanie Green, a founder of the Canadian Association of MAiD Assessors and Providers, traded in her decades-long practice as a maternity doctor to end lives. Both kinds of medicine, she told The Atlantic, are “deliveries.” Some doctors have reported euthanizing hundreds of patients and yet, the demand exceeds the supply. 

Canada’s Parliament legalized MAiD in 2016, promising increased autonomy and decreased suffering. Instead, the practice has corrupted medicine, threatened conscience rights, pressured the vulnerable, and expanded the culture of death. As the American Medical Association’s official opinion articulates, “Euthanasia is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer, would be difficult or impossible to control, and would pose serious societal risks.” That’s especially true in single-payer health care systems like Canada has. Eventually, the decision of who should live and who should die will be determined by financial realities, justified by arbitrary ideas about “quality of life.”   

In fact, whenever and wherever it is legalized, the so-called “right” to die soon becomes a perceived “duty to die.” Though patients are promised “death with dignity” and an end to unnecessary suffering, patients consistently report not wanting to be “a burden” on friends or family. Many are convinced, as law and disability professor Theresia Degener described, “a life with disability is automatically less worth living and that in some cases, death is preferable.”   

Despite what Canadian officials have claimed, there are no effective “safeguards.” A report last year in the New Atlantis noted hundreds of serious violations of regulations in just the Ontario province, and none have been reported to law enforcement. Although Ontario Chief Coroner Dirk Huyer boasted, “Every case is reported. Everybody has scrutiny on all these cases,” physician whistleblowers identified over 400 “issues with compliance.” These range from patients killed who were not capable of consent to communication breakdowns with pharmacists providing the deadly prescriptions. For example, only 61% of physicians notify pharmacists about the purpose of the euthanasia medications prior to dispensation, as required.  

Even more troubling are reported cases of providers expediting euthanizing drugs to patients sooner than the legally required 10-day waiting period. In one case, euthanasia provider Dr. Eugenie Tjan administered the wrong drugs. When the patient did not die, the doctor had to administer different drugs to complete the assisted suicide. Huyer failed to report this, eventually admitting this was a “blatant” case of violating Canadian laws: “The family and the deceased person suffered tremendously.”   

Also, according to the report, about one quarter of all euthanasia providers in Ontario were notified by the coroner’s office of a compliance issue in 2023 alone. National law states that all reports should lead to criminal investigations, but Huyer failed to report even one. Instead, he determined that all issues in question required only an “informal conversation” with the practitioner. Dr. Tjan, for example, received an email of warning and remains licensed.   

To call this a “slippery slope” is an understatement. MAiD began as a practice limited to gravely ill patients at the end of life. The law has already expanded to include people suffering from serious medical conditions but not facing imminent death. MAiD will soon be available to those suffering only from mental illness. Parliament has also recommended granting access to minors. 

Assisted suicide is not a medical practice. Rather, it is a practice that corrupts medicine, risks abuse, and erodes public trust. The best-case scenario at this point is that Canada becomes a deterrent for the rest of the world, and that Christians there demonstrate courage in how they live and how they die.

Copyright 2025 by the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. Reprinted from BreakPoint.org with permission.

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West Virginia vs. Canada on Protecting Vulnerable Lives: Guest Column

Contrary to what Canadian officials have claimed, the “safeguards” put in place for the nation’s “medical assistance in dying” (MAID) practice are not sufficient. Highlighting the province of Ontario alone, a report in the New Atlantis notes that hundreds of serious violations have occurred, but none have been reported to law enforcement. 

In Ontario, the coroner’s office is responsible for monitoring euthanasia malpractice. Although Chief Coroner Dirk Huyer has boasted that “Every case is reported. Everybody has scrutiny on all these cases. . .,” physician whistleblowers have identified over 400 “issues with compliance,” ranging from patients killed who were not capable of consent to communication breakdowns with pharmacists providing the deadly prescriptions. For example, physicians are legally required to notify pharmacists about the purpose of the euthanasia medications prior to dispensation, but only 61% of physicians complied with this regulation.  

More troubling are various reported cases of providers expediting euthanizing drugs to patients sooner than the legally required 10-day waiting period. In one case, euthanasia provider Dr. Eugenie Tjan administered the wrong drugs. When the patient did not die, the doctor had to administer different drugs to complete the assisted suicide. Huyer failed to report this, eventually admitting this was a “blatant” case of violating Canadian laws: “The family and the deceased person suffered tremendously.”  

Also, according to the report, about one quarter of all euthanasia providers in Ontario have received at least one slap on the wrist response from the coroner’s office regarding a compliance issue in 2023 alone. According to national law, all reports should be opened as criminal investigations, but Huyer failed to report even one. Instead, he determined that all issues in question required only an “informal conversation” with the practitioner. Dr. Tjan, for example, received an email of warning and remains licensed.  

Making this story worse is that medically assisted suicide is now the fifth leading cause of death in Canada. The failure to minimize and regulate euthanasia there only confirms fears long articulated by critics. In fact, anywhere some form of doctor assisted death has been legalized, predictions of “slippery slopes” have been realized. For example, 10 states including the District of Columbia, have legalized physician-assisted suicide since 1994. In at least five, restrictions and regulations around the practice continue to be loosened, leading to increased harm. 

The good news is that it has been a few years since the last U.S. state legalized some form of doctor assisted suicide. Perhaps the only positive development of Canada’s quick slide down this slippery slope is that America has seen the horrors: what at one point seemed an inevitable march of our own, has slowed. Last year, in fact, West Virginia voters narrowly passed an amendment to proactively outlaw “medical assistance in dying” in that state. Among other things, the amendment recognizes that the state fundamentally exists not to give citizens whatever they want, but to protect the gift and right to life endowed by the Creator on all people, no matter how vulnerable. In this sense, West Virginia offers a useful model that other states can emulate.

Copyright 2025 by the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. Reprinted from BreakPoint.org with permission.

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