Paul Tuns:
New Cardus report says that medicalized killing of patients is now ‘routine’
According to Alex Schadenberg, there were approximately 15,280 euthanasia deaths in 2023 and a total of more than 60,000 from when so-called Medical Assistance in Dying was legalized in Canada in 2016 through to the end of last year.
Based on data released from Alberta, B.C., Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Quebec, euthanasia deaths have increased by 15.4 compared to MAiD deaths in those provinces in 2022. On July 8, Schadenberg extrapolated those numbers across the country and calculated that that there were nearly 15,300 euthanasia deaths in 2023 although not all provinces saw similar increases. Saskatchewan, for example, saw an increase of more than 25 per cent year over year, from 257 MAiD deaths in 2022 to 344 in 2023. Nova Scotia had 342 euthanasia deaths in 2023, also an increase of 25 per cent.
B.C. which had one of the highest rates of euthanasia in 2022, reported 2767 MAiD deaths in 2023, a 10 per cent increase compared to the previous year. Quebec, which has the highest percentage of MAiD deaths – 7.3 per cent of Quebec deaths were by euthanasia, the highest percentage in the world – had a 17 per cent increase in such deaths to a total of 5686.
Ontario had 4461 euthanasia deaths (up 18 per cent) and Alberta reported 977 euthanasia deaths (18 per cent increase).
Manitoba had 236 euthanasia deaths in 2023, a six per cent increase from the 223 the province had in 2022.
Schadenberg said, “According to the data from Ontario, Québec, Alberta, Nova Scotia, Manitoba, British Columbia and Saskatchewan, there were 14,757 assisted deaths in 2023 (in those provinces) which was up by 15.7 per cent from 12,747 assisted deaths in 2022 (in those provinces).” He added, “Since the total number of Canadian assisted deaths in 2022 was 13,241, we estimate that there were approximately 15,280 Canadian assisted deaths in 2023.”
A new study by Cardus, a think tank, “From Exceptional to Routine: The Rise of Euthanasia in Canada” was released August 7. It’s author, Alexander Raikin, looked at data from 2016 to 2022, the last year in which complete data available for all provinces when he wrote it, reported that “MAiD in Canada is the world’s fasted-growing assisted-dying program” with euthanasia “now tied with cerebrovascular diseases as the fifth leading cause of death in Canada.” Raikin observed, “Only deaths from cancer, heart disease, COVID-19, and accidents exceed the number of deaths from MAiD.”
The report said that in 2016, the first year in which euthanasia was legalized in all of Canada, there were 1018 euthanasia deaths; in 2022, there were 13,241, “a thirteenfold increase.” He said that “the data contradicts” the Trudeau government’s insistence that the increase has been gradual.
Raikin said that “Assisted dying was not meant to become a routine way of dying” with the anonymously written Supreme Court decision in Carter, which legalized euthanasia, saying it should be a “stringently limited, carefully monitored system of exceptions.” Then Minister of Justice and Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould agreed: “We do not wish to promote premature death as a solution to all medical suffering.” The Canadian Medical Association claimed MAiD was intended for rare situations.
But, says Raikin, “MAiD assessors and providers do not treat it as a last resort” with just 3.5 per cent of requests being denied. He noted that after restrictions on euthanasia were lifted by the Trudeau government, “MAiD requests can be assessed and provided in a single day.”
The Cardus report stated that Health Canada’s May 2022 estimate that euthanasia deaths would represent four per cent of all deaths by 2033 was, in fact, reached that same year, 11 years earlier than forecast.
Raikin takes issue with the fact that some provinces do not record MAiD as a cause of death, instead recording the underlying condition that led to the assisted-death request as the official cause of death and criticizes Statistics Canada for not reporting MAiD as a cause of death. He said those discrepancies could “have an impact on research about MAiD and about causes of death more generally” as there is a likely “systematic underestimation of MAiD in government” data.
Anti-euthanasia lawyer and bioethics researcher Wesley Smith, wrote at National Review Online, that Canada demonstrates “how darkly seductive” the euthanasia movement’s intent “to normalize lethal injections and assisted suicide as a means of dying, and certainly not just for the terminally ill, but for elderly people, those with disabilities, chronic illnesses, and mental issues, indeed, eventually anyone who wants to die.”
