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Canada Makes It Harder to Die, but There’s a Catch
The Free Press • • world
Key Points:
- Canada has decided to indefinitely halt the expansion of medical assistance in dying (MAID) to individuals whose sole reason for seeking it is mental illness, following five years of debate and investigation.
- Justice Minister Sean Fraser announced that legislation will be introduced this fall to stop the planned expansion, responding to concerns raised by an advisory committee against allowing MAID for mental illness.
- Canada currently has one of the highest rates of assisted suicide globally, with MAID accounting for 1 in every 20 deaths, and eligibility based on intolerable suffering rather than terminal illness.
- The government cited significant concerns about inadequate mental health services in some communities and the lack of medical consensus on when mental illness is truly irremediable as reasons for halting the expansion.
- This decision marks a rare limit on the growth of MAID in Canada, which had previously seen a steady increase in assisted deaths over the past decade.
