1 week Ago By Postmedia News
Article content When a committee of the United Nations makes recommendations regarding human rights in Canada, we tend to yawn. Not only are many UN member states hardly bastions of democracy, but many of them are dictatorships, theocracies or other forms of authoritarian government, so it’s hard to take their criticism of this country seriously. In a March 21 report, the UN Committee on the Rights of People with Disabilities called on Canada to repeal its 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.
While this all seems a bit rich coming from the UN, this committee does make some valid points. 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. 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 next government must proceed with caution as it moves forward with MAID..
