Canadian doctors struggle with euthanasia standards, investigation shows

Healthcare workers in Canada report feeling unsettled about legally euthanizing patients whose suffering could have been alleviated through money, housing, or social connections, according to an Associated Press investigation released Wednesday. The report claimed that people with treatable ailments or preventable deaths have requested assisted suicide. They included a homeless person unable to afford long-term care, a patient with severe obesity, an injured worker with poor government assistance, and others.

Adults may legally receive euthanasia, commonly referred to as medical assistance in death, if they suffer from a severe and incurable—though not fatal—illness or disability, according to Canadian law. Doctors and nurses in a private forum shared moral misgivings about ending the lives of adults with a disability or those refusing medical care, the Associated Press report alleged. Medical staff also shared concerns of legal repercussions from euthanizing patients with non-terminal illnesses and feared the law’s language was too vague to protect practitioners.

How often is the euthanasia law really used? Euthanasia was supposed to be a solution for very rare cases, but providers aren’t treating it as the last resort, the Christian think tank Cardus said. Assisted suicide is tied with cerebrovascular as the fifth most common cause of death in Canada, according to an August report from the think tank. Only about 3.5 percent of assisted suicide requests are denied, with some requests being considered and administered on the same day, the report added. The number of medically assisted deaths ballooned from about 1,000 when the program began in 2016, to over 13,000 in the latest 2022 data. 

Dig deeper: Read Alexandra Ellison’s report on religious hospitals struggling with euthanasia requirements.