Clock is ticking on changes to MAID laws
Senators must find a way to support needed changes before the end of February
Mother Teresa comes to mind while watching the politics of magnanimity play out among lawmakers around medical assistance in dying (MAID). The nun was at her Bombay (now Mumbai) hospice, where I interviewed her. At the time, she had her own troubles with being anti-abortion for incest-pregnancies and under-18 rapes. In contrast was the quality of her mercy, to paraphrase Shakespeare, showering like gentle rain upon the dying under her care.
It’s this quality of mercy which Senators need to urgently display this month. Bill C-7 — proposing specific Criminal Code changes to MAID law — has received its third extension, until Feb. 26, from Quebec’s Superior Court. The date is significant. According to the Department of Justice’s Ian McLeod, “If Bill C-7 is not adopted by Parliament by February 26, 2021, and if no further extensions of the Truchon ruling are sought or granted, the ‘reasonable foreseeability of natural death’ criterion from the federal criminal law would no longer be applicable in the province of Quebec, but would remain in effect in other provinces and territories.”
Simply put: Quebec shall have a refined law, the rest of Canada will not.
DOJ maintains that Bill C-7 itself “does not lapse” if the deadline passes. Nonetheless, why play catch-up with Quebec, why another delay on a matter of such importance? Parliamentarians have had extensive consultations among themselves; before which experts and stakeholders such as this writer have weighed in with their suggestions, a staggering 300,000 Canadians have answered a DOJ questionnaire.
After three readings in the House of Commons, Bill C-7 was introduced in the Senate on Dec. 10, 2020. There has also been a Senate prereport
The second reading debate began on Dec. 14, the bill was adopted on Dec. 17 and referred to the Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs. To complete its consideration of the proposed legislation, the Senate has 12 fixed sitting days and seven possible ones in February.
The anxiety by some on C-7 isn’t aversion to MAID itself: Canada made international headlines for its empathy with dying-with-dignity on Feb. 6, 2015, when its Supreme Court permitted physician-assisted death in specific situations. In 2016, Parliament cleared MAID wherein terminally-ill adults could end their suffering, if they so chose.
Consent continues to be key in C-7. Nevertheless, the nervousness is over the Quebec Court’s removal of “reasonable foreseeability of natural death.” Justice Christine Bauduoin’s gracefully-worded and elegantly-explained ruling is worth a read to allay anxiety.
Notwithstanding, to ensure that there is no tainted consent — with none 18-or-older who have a “grievous and irremediable medical condition” feeling obliged to die or being bullied into it — C-7 provides for new safeguards. There is further clarity in an additional proviso on change-of-mind.
Meanwhile, informed consent has been used by Jean Truchon — he and Nicole Gladu had approached the Quebec Court — to receive MAID 11 weeks earlier than the intended June 22, 2020, due to COVID-19.
Truchon had lost the use of his only functioning limb, his left arm, in 2012. Gladu, wheelchair-bound due to post-polio syndrome, enjoys her quality of life, over the quantity of it, in Montreal. The 75-year-old scoffs at the idea of equating disability with feeling pressured to die.
There have been reports that given the sentiments of a few who don’t feel like Gladu, all patients eligible for MAID shouldn’t be told about it until they bring it up themselves. There is the obvious question: how can patients be the first to talk about MAID if they don’t know about it?
Above all, there are patient-rights: to make an informed choice, no patient can be denied full information on medical options available including the right to die without exacerbated anguish. To deliberately leave out MAID would be a violation of the right to equal treatment. To deny all because of a vocal few is reverse discrimination.
Pass C-7, please. Then let’s get on with the mandated — on June 17, 2016 — five-year MAID-review.
In June let’s talk about Advance Directives, also called Advanced Requests. (Not to be confused with Living Wills which can demand Active Euthanasia; MAID is about Passive Euthanasia only.) Interestingly, the additional safeguards in C-7 pave the way — albeit obliquely — for ADs. Canadians above 18 should be able to formulate their AD if they have been newly-diagnosed with a condition — physical, mental — that could affect their decision-making capacities later. Might this open a window for MAID-eligibility for some forms of mental illness? Well, let’s talk about it; let’s especially hear those diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s or dementia or any mind which has started to slip into irreversible decline.
Let’s hope that 2021 continues Canada’s conversation about quiet compassion on dignified dying.