Submission to the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs on Bill C-7: An Act to amend the Criminal Code (Medical Assistance In Dying)
Frederick Harrison 3 Mossford Court Etobicoke ON M9B 5T3 harrison.fw @gmail.com
I wish to express my support for the two briefs made to the Senate by the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada: https://files.evangelicalfellowship.ca/si/Euthanasia/C-7-brief-to-Senate-LA-Committee-Nov-25-2020.pdf https://files.evangelicalfellowship.ca/si/Euthanasia/MAID_Religious-Leaders-oppose-Bill-C-7_Oct- 2020.pdf
I also wish to express my support for the concerns of many organizations that work with developmentally or physically disabled persons. https://www.evangelicalfellowship.ca/Resources/Podcasts/MAID-and-the-Disabled
I do not wish to quote verbatim arguments made in these documents but expand upon some of them and introduce new arguments and perspectives into the debate. First off, a bit of history. I’d like to revisit the Omnibus Bill of 1968: “In 1969, the government of Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau amended the Criminal Code. Doctors were allowed to perform abortions in accredited hospitals if a pregnancy threatened the health or life of a woman. A committee of doctors was required to approve the procedure. In all other circumstances, abortion remained illegal.” “In 1967, during the early days of this debate, the Royal Commission on the Status of Women was convened by the federal government. After three years of public hearings, it issued a groundbreaking report on women’s affairs. The report recommended that abortion be made legal for the first 12 weeks of a pregnancy. It said that after 12 weeks, abortions should only be legal if the pregnancy threatened the health of the woman; or if the expected child would be born “greatly handicapped” mentally or physically.” (https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/abortion) [emphasis mine] It is clear that the government’s intention was to make abortion available – but with clearly defined guidelines and restrictions, informed by public consultations with those directly affected by the legislation.
In fact, Pierre Trudeau, reiterated the need for accountability in the following statement made in an article in The Montreal Star on Thursday, May 25, 1972 – four years after his Omnibus Bill: “You know, at some point you are killing life in the foetus in self-defence – of what? Of the mother’s health or her happiness or of her social rights or her privilege as a human being? I think she should have to answer for it and explain. Now, whether it should be to three doctors or one doctor or to a priest or a bishop or to her mother-in-law is a question you might want to argue …. You do have a right over your own body – it is your body. But the foetus is not your body; it’s someone else’s body. And if you kill it, you’ll have to explain.” ( http://www.prowomanprolife.org/2014/06/21/pierre-trudeau-youll-have-to-answer-for-your- abortion/ ) [emphasis mine] Dr. Henry Morgentaler did away with the government’s restrictions and demand for accountability by offering to perform abortion upon demand, with few or no restrictions. “ Henry Morgentaler was prosecuted for performing unauthorized abortions. He was acquitted by a jury in 1973. However, on appeal, both the Quebec Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada overturned the jury finding. Morgentaler served a prison term. (https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/abortion) Pierre Elliot Trudeau was questioned about his Omnibus Bill of 1968 on CBC News Magazine on Jan. 23, 1968, specifically as to whether the legislation was too progressive. He made these two comments: “I always feel that if you’re on the liberal side, you should tend to be… take risks on the side of progress and if you’re going to be beaten, you should be beaten because you’ve been too progressive, rather than take risks on the side of not moving and be beaten for not moving fast enough.”
“I…I quite frankly feel that on the abortion provisions we do go far enough. I wouldn’t like to see the conception of eugenics being introduced into our law. I wouldn’t like to see the law deciding now about unborn babies and whether, you know, the state should say we can have institutions deciding whether they might not be healthy or something like that. I’m concerned with the mother but I’m not concerned with abortion because something might happen to the child. “ ( https://www.cbc.ca/archives/entry/challenging-canadas-sacred-cows )[emphasis mine]
It is my considered opinion that the problem with this legislation is not that it is too progressive, but that it removes protections against targeting certain age groups and medical conditions for euthanasia. Years ago, the death penalty was revoked because it was considered barbaric and the possibility that an innocent person may be executed by an error in judgment outweighed the need to use death as a deterrent against murder. There have been many who have been wrongfully convicted of murder since then that would have perished under the old law. Whereas we have had, in the past, laws that forbade the taking of life, we are now about to pass legislation making exceptions to that law, argued on the grounds of mercy.
It may seem like I am comparing apples and oranges here, confusing those who are beginning life with those who are nearing the end of it, or are living with a reduced quality of life. But there are concerns from the abortion legislation that carry over to the debate about MAID, specifically matters of regulation and accountability. Let me reframe part of the quote from above, substituting “seniors or people with a reduced quality of life” for “unborn babies”:
I wouldn’t like to see the conception of eugenics being introduced into our law. I wouldn’t like to see the law deciding now about seniors or people with a reduced quality of life and whether, you know, the state should say we can have institutions deciding whether they might not be healthy or something like that. Though these are not the words of Pierre Trudeau the meaning carries over from his original concerns. Are these not the issues being addressed in the legislation before you now? Deciding whether seniors or people with a reduced quality of life should continue to live? Allowing institutions to determine their state of heath to the point where they are empowered to make decisions about life and the termination thereof?
What is there in this legislation to prevent a present day equivalent of Dr. Morgentaler from opening a suicide-on-demand clinic or a “mercy clinic” (as they will no doubt be called) to help caregivers end the (perceived) suffering of their loved ones, with assurances that all the proper paperwork will be taken care of? Or to prevent individuals or groups from deciding on their own that a person’s life ought to be terminated and seeking to engage services to effect that end, regardless of whether the one being “euthanized” gave a clear, informed, consent?
Two examples of people making the decision to euthanize others should suffice to illustrate my concern.
Robert Latimer murdered his own developmentally delayed daughter Tracy, claiming that he did so on the grounds of mercy that she was suffering and that her death would end it. The courts did not accept his rationalization. Tracy did not have the mental capacity to give consent to his actions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Latimer Elizabeth Wettlaufer took it upon herself to administer lethal doses of insulin to patients under her care, claiming that voices from inside her body compelled her to do it. She is convicted of eight counts of murder and six counts of attempted murder. Her crimes are more disturbing considering her religious upbringing and awareness that her actions were wrong. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Wettlaufer If MAID passes, will these two be exonerated for their crimes and hailed as saints of mercy? I should hope not! In 2018, a Personal Care Worker was fired after a closed circuit camera revealed her telling an elder incapacitated woman to “Die, die, you bitch! You need to die now!” How easy it would be for this PSW to make this wish a reality by abusing the provision of MAID? https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1140362307893 Under the proposed legislation, what safeguards are there to ensure that the required paperwork for MAID will be filled out correctly, with arms-length disinterested witnesses, and with a patient’s clear and informed consent, especially (if able) before they are to be euthanized? Who will check the signatures to ensure doctors have signed off on the form and that there are no forged signatures? Will there be questions asked about possible motives from staff or management of long term care homes to “dispose” of a “troublesome” resident or those whose care requires an inordinate amount of time or supplies?
The eugenics concern raised by Pierre Trudeau in 1968 is still relevant today. This article from the American Spectator, dated Oct. 17, 2019 discusses such concerns with regard to the proposed legislation before you now and is an American perspective on our legislation – something that needs to be taken into consideration in safeguarding our relationship with the USA: https://spectator.org/targeting-people-with-mental-illness-and-dementia-for-euthanasia/
Moreover, this legislation is at cross purposes to our government’s stated intent to address the epidemic of suicide on Canadian Indigenous people’s reserves. The danger that present and future governments may find it more “expedient” and fiscally “efficient” to send MAID teams onto reserves instead of funding mental health clinics and their supports is real, given previous government policies and treatment of First Nations people.
In the same way it is at cross purposes with the objectives of palliative care, mental health care, senior care, and medical care workers and practitioners whose efforts are directed at preserving life at the highest possible level with the highest level of relief from suffering. The ongoing “Not Today” suicide awareness-prevention campaign will become “Anytime you want” under this legislation.
Indeed the very fact that there is suicide poses a troubling question: If the most technologically advanced civilization that has ever existed on this planet is as marvellous and wonderful, as we claim it to be, why are great numbers of people – especially young people - choosing annihilation over continued participation at the cusp of the “brave new world” that our politicians and futurists say is within our grasp? It needs pointing out that this malady is peculiar to Western civilization and is almost absent in second and third world nations. Such behaviour points to something fundamentally wrong with our world that we have not grasped, or would rather deny than grasp. But rather than attempt to identify and correct the wrong, we are content to encourage and hasten others in their plunge into the abyss. This shows the extent of our regard for human life, that we are willing to hasten its end rather than preserve it.
(C.S. Lewis The Abolition of Man is a slim book of 64 pages and has much to say on humanity’s present condition. I highly recommend reading it. He posits that we have strayed from that which civilizes humankind, namely traditions common to all great civilizations and faith traditions – save our present one – concerning: i) general beneficence, ii) special beneficence, iii) duties to parents, elders, and ancestors iv) duties to children and posterity, v ) the law of justice vi) the law of good faith and veracity vii) the law of mercy viii) the law of magnanimity)
Changes to access to abortion resulted in hospitals once run by faith based institutions and the staff that worked in them being compelled to provide access to abortion against their beliefs. Many moved from funding and operating hospitals to funding and operating faith-based hospices, senior’s residences, and long term care homes. If this legislation passes, these facilities will be under the same pressure to provide access to MAID – again, regardless of the beliefs of owners, operators, or staff. I understand that individual rights are not an absolute but when did the state acquire the absolute right to dictate what my beliefs shall be?
Here is where this legislation gets personal. I am a 65 year old man who is living with depression. There have been moments when I have had suicidal thoughts – but those ideations passed. I take medication to moderate my depression and, except for a gap of about two years, I have been on medication since my first clinical diagnosis of depression in 2000. This week I had an online consultation with a psychiatrist to address my current state of mental health which, because of COVID related stress, social isolation, and seasonal affective disorder is deteriorating. She increased the medication for my depression – but cautioned me that one of the side effects of the increase may be suicidal ideation.
I am able to live a functional and productive life because of my medication; without it I would be bedridden and minimally functional. Abruptly discontinuing taking the medication is not an option – especially as the side effects includes increased paranoia and suicide ideation. I want to live!
I am heavily invested in taking care of myself to achieve that end.
But your proposed legislation may take that decision away from me if I ever expressed suicidal ideas while suffering the side effects of that medication. If I end up experiencing a mental health crisis and express a desire to die what guarantee is there that that desire will NOT be acted upon by a MAID team, even and especially if I change my mind in the interim. “But he said he wanted to die!” even signed by myself and witnessed by a doctor should never trump a subsequent contrary decision expressed by myself or my family, power of attorney, or living will. The reason for this is that people can – and do- change their minds – or have them restored to rationality and sanity. Yet you are removing such safeguards against a change of mind, based on the deterioration of the mind from Alzheimer’s or dementia which are special conditions that may justify MAID but don’t apply to other medical conditions.
We are in the midst of a worldwide mental health crisis, brought on by the social isolation necessitated by the lockdown to slow the spread of COVID-19. ( https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2020/12/05/one-in-10-canadians-say-theyve-contemplated- suicide-since-the-pandemic-began.html ) Suicidal thoughts, especially among young people, have increased dramatically. Under the proposed changes to the legislation regarding MAID, it will be easier to commit suicide rather than being referred to counselling or being prescribed anti-depressants. I can envision a time when it will be argued that suicide prevention lines should be discontinued as it interferes with a person’s “choice”.
I also take issue with someone else making a determination regarding a person’s quality of life, especially as it concerns terminating that life. The most frequently heard justification for MAID is suffering – bit I must ask whose suffering is being considered? The person who is suffering or the caregiver?
What may be mistaken for compassion is the inability of one person to watch the suffering (assumed or visible) of another person. They would rather not see suffering and wish to remove it, not by treating the sufferer to reduce or remove the cause of suffering, but by removing the person who is suffering. Their “compassion” is rationalized as a justification for their refusal to countenance suffering; it is, in fact, a complete denial of compassion (suffering with) and empathy (understanding the emotions and mindset of the other person) – the pathology of a narcissist whose sole concern is their own feelings and are incapable of imagining what someone else might be feeling. Such a person is also incapable of sympathy – the understanding of others’ suffering.
Years ago I volunteered at Holland-Bloorview Children’s Hospital and received from one of the staff members this important insight: our imaginings of what the children are suffering do not correspond to their actual feelings. We see a child that is deaf and we relate it to our experience of hearing and think how horrible it must be not to hear. But the child has never had the experience of hearing to compare against the experience of not hearing, which means that they cannot comprehend the loss of a sense they never had the use of. They may feel the effect of sound waves on their skin but that is not the same sensation as hearing. The same thing applies to all organic disabilities – the child whose legs have been non-functional since birth has never known the experience of walking; the person whose cognitive ability is limited cannot comprehend the limitation of his/her mind.
In the same way, what we imagine the suffering of others to be is not necessarily what the person is experiencing as suffering. As such, our evaluations of quality of life may differ greatly from the person experiencing that life. Were we to momentarily experience the aches and pains of a person who is ill or whose body is experiencing the effects of age we might find it to be intolerable, while the person accepts them as normal, having acclimatized themselves to their condition.
There is also the intolerance of certain conditions experienced by some people, which they would see as degrading or intolerable if they were themselves afflicted with such conditions. A good example is incontinence, the onset of which is a “driver” to put seniors or invalids into nursing homes rather than attempt to treat or manage the condition at home( https://www.healthing.ca/wellness/incontinence- treatment-seniors ). The prospect of needing a colostomy bag or urinary catheters are other examples that some would find intolerable.
Harry Nilsson wrote a song “I’d Rather Be Dead” and recorded it with backing vocals supplied by seniors with this couplet “I’d rather be dead / than wet my bed.” While the song expresses the disgust of those who suffer the condition – and those who have to deal with the fetid laundry - the desire to be dead is understood to be hyperbole and not a sincere wish for MAID. But someone who is sickened and offended by someone else’s incontinence may not feel that way and their desire to be rid of the person with the condition can express itself as a belief that the sufferer would be “better off dead” and propose MAID as an end to the perceived suffering.
I also have concern that financial considerations will trump compassion for human needs in the austerity that will be necessary during the economic recovery from COVID, particularly as regards funding for suicide prevention, palliative care, and long term care. The failure to adequately fund palliative care exposes the preference for a swift dispatch of the “suffering” over a death with dignity and comfort. The human cost of fiscal “efficiencies” is rarely taken into consideration. That seniors and chronically ill people were triaged out of receiving ventilator support for COVID shows not only a parsimonious approach to health care spending, but a disregard for human life, especially in the knowledge that a pandemic had been anticipated for years, yet little preparation was made for it. I wonder what progress has been made in alleviating the lack of ventilators, hospital beds, and COVID treatment equipment since January of this year.
Which brings me to my final point – are any of you willing to be dispatched perfunctorily “into that good night” (Dylan Thomas poem – Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night) by relatives desiring their inheritance now instead of later, or by the government-appointed angels of death in order to attain “efficiencies” in health care spending, or by those provided with the opportunity and means to dispatch those whom they hate because of differences in creed, colour, race, gender, or association, who have been entrusted to their care?
In summary, the proposed changes to MAID do little to protect the vulnerable, rather they undermine whatever protection that was provided in the original legislation, opening up the possibility of murder disguised as “mercy”. As such, I ask you to veto such changes and send the legislation back to the House of Commons, with the concerns expressed by myself and others attached.
Frederick Harrison