Assisted dying now accounts for one in 20 Canada deaths. Is the US next?

[wetris]

Medically-assisted dying – also known as voluntary euthanasia – accounted for 4.7% of deaths in Canada in 2023, new government data shows.

The country's fifth annual report since euthanasia was legalised in 2016 showed around 15,300 people underwent assisted dying last year after being successful in their applications.

The median age of this group was more than 77. The vast majority – around 96% - had a death deemed "reasonably foreseeable", due to severe medical conditions such as cancer.

In the small minority of other cases, patients may not have been terminally ill, but sought an assisted death due to a long and complicated illness that had significantly impacted their quality of life.

Canada is among a few countries that have introduced assisted dying laws in the past decade. Others include Australia, New Zealand, Spain and Austria.

In Canada, consenting adults can request medical assistance in dying from a healthcare provider if they have a serious and irremediable medical condition.

Some provisions are in place, including a requirement of having two independent healthcare providers confirm that the patient is eligible before their request is approved.

More than 320,000 people died in Canada in 2023, and 15,300 of those deaths - about one in 20 - were medically assisted.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0j1z14p57po

Do you support assisted suicide? Would you personally consider voluntary euthanasia for yourself at some point?

[Joe Biden 2028]

No

[Red Willow]

I support the option of assisted suicide in the case of the terminally ill. It should never be used for depression, and it's misuse in Canada is a disgrace.

[KakyoinMemeHouse]

Nobody cares.

[Skill and Chance]

This has gone off the deep end in Canada, in a way that fundamentally vindicates SoCon slippery slope arguments in general.  Let's not open Pandora's box here.

[wetris]

This has gone off the deep end in Canada, in a way that fundamentally vindicates SoCon slippery slope arguments in general.  Let's not open Pandora's box here.

Life can be difficult. If someone is of legal age, and decides they don't want to continue going on, why not find a legal remedy, if it exists?

[Horus]

Very disturbing. I'm not inherently opposed to this, but there's way too much room for abuse. Not to mention the easy arguments this provides for opponents of universal healthcare.

[ingemann]

Very disturbing. I'm not inherently opposed to this, but there's way too much room for abuse. Not to mention the easy arguments this provides for opponents of universal healthcare.

I’m mostly curious why this thread is in U.S. General Discussion.

[Blue3]

If it’s their choice, with no pressure, I don’t see why it’s necessarily bad. Have any of you visited a loved one everyday in hospice, and literally hold their hand as they died?

I have.

Even with my grandmother’s peaceful, gentle death in a compassionate and private hospice setting… it actually made me more scared about the process of dying. First the hallucinations, which maybe aren’t that bad, hers were at least reliving her childhood. But then being unable to eat or drink water, just a sponge to carefully wet and moisten the mouth every once in a while. The mouth almost permanently open for days, and so dehydrated the sponge barely does anything, and can’t have more water or you can choke. Being unable to speak anymore, barely able to open your eyes. Thin and pale. For about 10-15 days, just waiting for it to finish its natural course after you can no longer eat or drink, your blood overflowing with painkillers, your brain so starved of nutrients it’s slowly becoming a vegetable through atrophy even if you had zero dementia issues just a week or two before the end. This is if you’re lucky, the most peaceful way to go naturally of old age.

If you have a terminal, irreversible condition, and not far from death or already entering severe pain or dementia, you should have the right to make that choice (and to have a living will, with assisted suicide as an option, in case it happens too quickly).

Don’t be so quick to judge these 5% of deaths in Canada. And the healthcare system is worse in the United States too.

[DrScholl]

The United States is too full of people who want government to legislate every social issue under the sun (while being hands off on economic ones) for assisted death to ever be really legal here. Americans aren't capable of functioning in anything but emotional hysterics that don't consider individual rights.

[Lief 🗽]

The dirty secret is that many of the terminally ill people in American hospitals and hospices are also dying with assistance, just not in a regulated or official way. I wouldn’t be surprised if our death rates were similar if you could actually count it.

[Progressive Pessimist]

It's way too taboo to be as mainstream here.

[New World Man]

Cutting Medicaid and SNAP fits the same purpose.

[The People's Liberation Army of Rancho Cucamonga]

If 96% of these people had cancer or some other similarly incurable condition, what exactly is the problem here? I would only be concerned if this was expanded as a """treatment""" for people with psychological disorders or depression.

[Existing in the context]

Well yes, but in America we call it Arbys

[Skill and Chance]

If 96% of these people had cancer or some other similarly incurable condition, what exactly is the problem here? I would only be concerned if this was expanded as a """treatment""" for people with psychological disorders or depression.

1. The legal definition of incurable/unbearable always seems to monotonically expand in countries that allow this

2. In the long term, when this becomes widespread will disincentivize societal investment in treating/curing certain very dangerous medical conditions.  This creates a situation where a fatal condition might not have been fatal if it had been adequately researched in a prior generation.

[Wrong about 2024 Ghost]

Very disturbing. I'm not inherently opposed to this, but there's way too much room for abuse. Not to mention the easy arguments this provides for opponents of universal healthcare.

I’m mostly curious why this thread is in U.S. General Discussion.

Because Trump's planned invasion of Canada will see a lot of well-funded astroturfed fearmongering about Canada to support it.

[The People's Liberation Army of Rancho Cucamonga]

If 96% of these people had cancer or some other similarly incurable condition, what exactly is the problem here? I would only be concerned if this was expanded as a """treatment""" for people with psychological disorders or depression.

1. The legal definition of incurable/unbearable always seems to monotonically expand in countries that allow this

2. In the long term, when this becomes widespread will disincentivize societal investment in treating/curing certain very dangerous medical conditions.  This creates a situation where a fatal condition might not have been fatal if it had been adequately researched in a prior generation.

Maybe, but aren't most of these people seeking assisted suicide at the point where the disease is causing them daily pain and has metastasized to the point of being inoperable? Even if these types of people are getting Kevorkian'd, that doesn't disincentivize the medical community from investing in early detection and treatment.

If they're actually getting assisted suicide upon merely being diagnosed, then yeah, that's a bit extreme. Not something I would blame a person for individually, but also not something that should be widely encouraged or adopted.

[Rhode Islander First, American Second]

Hopefully. It is dignified and noble to be in charge of your own destiny.

[DrScholl]

Canada's law includes many safeguards. A person has to be assessed to see if they meet the requirement that their illness grievous and irremediable, be given the choice of treatment options, have a witness with no conflicting interest sign the form and the patient can change their mind right up until the procedure is administered.

Assisted death for mental health conditions is not available until 2027 and the assessment barriers will have to meet grievous and irremediable. There is almost no chance that anyone will receive assistance for being temporarily suicidal over something like losing a job or a breakup, etc.

[หมูเด้ง]

If 96% of these people had cancer or some other similarly incurable condition, what exactly is the problem here? I would only be concerned if this was expanded as a """treatment""" for people with psychological disorders or depression.

Or for anyone who can’t give consent or if there is a reasonable doubt to the futility of their condition. But generally I don’t understand this taboo. Luckily my stepfather’s end of life period was only 7 or 8 days, after a tumor the size of a softball formed in a matter of months around his pancreases, stomach, gallbladder, and liver and did not respond to treatment. It could have easily gone a lot worse.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

This has gone off the deep end in Canada, in a way that fundamentally vindicates SoCon slippery slope arguments in general.  Let's not open Pandora's box here.

It actually hasn't. You are making false claims on the basis of disinformation which is rife aboout MAiD.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

The dirty secret is that many of the terminally ill people in American hospitals and hospices are also dying with assistance, just not in a regulated or official way. I wouldn’t be surprised if our death rates were similar if you could actually count it.

And then there are those who commit suicide before they can't by killing themselves with a gun. I don't know what it says about Americans that they think they have a right to preach morality to other countries when in their own country they regard it as sacrosanct to own guns whose only purpose is to kill.

American hypocrisy is what's disturbing.

Of course, I'm aware that most of this from Americans stems from a desire to control other people and not out of any genuine concern for life, even in a patronizing way.

[MaynardFriedman]

I am sure Curtis Yarvin and Mr. Musk would happily jam this down the throats of Americans if the oligarchy successfully destroys the American political system. It is the natural destination for austerians who believe in "human biodiversity" (eugenics) and they would love to take money from SSDI or Medicare or Social Security by promoting euthanasia.

It is much harder to imagine Democrats promoting something like MAID. Thankfully, given our country's history and the reliance of the party on deeply religious racial minorities who have been victims of cruel government health experiments, something like MAID would be viewed with immense skepticism here. Liberals in Canada are unburdened from morality that comes from scripture. It's a small saving grace of this country that the poor often go to church.

[Tokugawa Sexgod Ieyasu]

We aren't discussing Canadian assisted suicide policy in USGD.