Canada Will Legalize Medically Assisted Dying For People Addicted To Drugs 265
An anonymous reader quotes a report from VICE News: Canada will legalize medically assisted dying for people who are addicted to drugs next spring, in a move some drug users and activists are calling "eugenics." The country's medical assistance in dying (MAID) law, which first came into effect in 2016, will be expanded next March to give access to people whose sole medical condition is mental illness, which can include substance use disorders. Before the changes take place, however, a special parliamentary committee on MAID will regroup to scrutinize the rollout of the new regulations, according to the Toronto Star.
Currently, people are eligible for MAID if they have a "grievous and irremediable medical condition", such as a serious illness or disability, that has put them in an advanced state of irreversible decline and caused enduring physical or psychological suffering -- excluding mental illness. Anyone who receives MAID must also go through two assessments from independent health care providers, among meeting other criteria. [...] As Canada prepares to legalize MAID for people with mental disorders, each province will have to develop its own protocol for how to assess people. Dr. Simon Colgan, lead physician for the Community Allied Mobile Palliative Partnership which provides palliative care to homeless people, said MAID requests "must be understood within the context of a person's lived experience and this takes time and relationship." He said any MAID protocols for people with substance use disorders should be made with the input of people with lived experiences. "I don't think it's fair, and the government doesn't think it's fair, to exclude people from eligibility because their medical disorder or their suffering is related to a mental illness," said Dr. David Martell, physician lead for Addictions Medicine at Nova Scotia Health. "As a subset of that, it's not fair to exclude people from eligibility purely because their mental disorder might either partly or in full be a substance use disorder. It has to do with treating people equally."
On the flip side, some drug users and harm reduction advocates say they're upset drug users are being given access to MAID, as they feel other public health measures are lacking. "I just think that MAID when it has entered the area around mental health and substance use is really rooted in eugenics. And there are people who are really struggling around substance use and people do not actually get the kind of support and help they need," said Zoe Dodd, a Toronto-based harm reduction advocate.
Karen Ward, a drug user activist in Vancouver, said she considers the expansion of MAID to include people with substance use disorders a "statement in federal law that some people aren't really human." "The government has made death accessible while a better life remains impossible," she said. "Homes for all, guaranteed dignified incomes, access to healthcare, education and employment: these aren't radical demands."
Currently, people are eligible for MAID if they have a "grievous and irremediable medical condition", such as a serious illness or disability, that has put them in an advanced state of irreversible decline and caused enduring physical or psychological suffering -- excluding mental illness. Anyone who receives MAID must also go through two assessments from independent health care providers, among meeting other criteria. [...] As Canada prepares to legalize MAID for people with mental disorders, each province will have to develop its own protocol for how to assess people. Dr. Simon Colgan, lead physician for the Community Allied Mobile Palliative Partnership which provides palliative care to homeless people, said MAID requests "must be understood within the context of a person's lived experience and this takes time and relationship." He said any MAID protocols for people with substance use disorders should be made with the input of people with lived experiences. "I don't think it's fair, and the government doesn't think it's fair, to exclude people from eligibility because their medical disorder or their suffering is related to a mental illness," said Dr. David Martell, physician lead for Addictions Medicine at Nova Scotia Health. "As a subset of that, it's not fair to exclude people from eligibility purely because their mental disorder might either partly or in full be a substance use disorder. It has to do with treating people equally."
On the flip side, some drug users and harm reduction advocates say they're upset drug users are being given access to MAID, as they feel other public health measures are lacking. "I just think that MAID when it has entered the area around mental health and substance use is really rooted in eugenics. And there are people who are really struggling around substance use and people do not actually get the kind of support and help they need," said Zoe Dodd, a Toronto-based harm reduction advocate.
Karen Ward, a drug user activist in Vancouver, said she considers the expansion of MAID to include people with substance use disorders a "statement in federal law that some people aren't really human." "The government has made death accessible while a better life remains impossible," she said. "Homes for all, guaranteed dignified incomes, access to healthcare, education and employment: these aren't radical demands."
Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Insightful)
Not that I have a whole lot of love for drug addicts, but I feel like this is a weird and inhuman treatment option for those that recognize they have a problem.
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Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Interesting)
But drug addiction is treatable. Eugenics for a treatable condition makes no sense.
If voluntary it's not eugenics,its family planning (Score:3)
Once someone has gotten to the 10 year point of a continual daily use meth habit they are probably past 'curable'.
I literally see this every day, I clean the washrooms and the park for a community centre that draws in meth and opiate addicts because of its 'harm reduction program'.
We have people that I saw for the first time 10 years ago when they came to the park for their second taste after trying it at a party, and a decade later they are literally still here, sleeping on the ground and subsisting on gra
Drug addiction is a medical condition... right? (Score:2)
For many years advocates of more liberal drug policy have argued that addiction should be treated as a medical condition. And we're always told that mental illness should be seen as just another illness -- you wouldn't stigmatize or blame someone for having a broken arm, so you shouldn't do so if they are schizophrenic.
Well, isn't this the logical outcome? If a medical condition is severe enough to destroy your quality of life, and it isn't curable, then in some countries you have the option of assisted s
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Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, I can support this for something like end-stage cancer or AIDS, but drug addiction... Not sure about this.
Why not? It's their choice. Isn't that the argument for legalizing drugs? Let people do what they want with their body AND have the government help them. How is this any different? The people are making their own choice AND the government will help them.
You can't have it both ways. If you say it's someone's choice to use drugs then it is also their choice to end their life. One is just quicker than the other.
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Yeah, I can support this for something like end-stage cancer or AIDS, but drug addiction... Not sure about this.
Why not? It's their choice. Isn't that the argument for legalizing drugs? Let people do what they want with their body AND have the government help them.
That's not the argument for legalizing drugs. The argument for legalizing drugs is to allow users access to help without fear of prosecution, to ensure product safety, to facilitate better public health administration, and to take drug trade out of the hands of criminals.
Legalization has nothing to do with the argument that "people can do whatever they want with their bodies". People do whatever they want with their bodies regardless.
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:4, Insightful)
Not that I have a whole lot of love for drug addicts, but I feel like this is a weird and inhuman treatment option for those that recognize they have a problem.
I agree.
Drug addicts have issues that ultimately lead to their untimely deaths, but now Canada wants to put in an EXPRESS LANE to expedite the process
First, a disposable society filled with disposable good. Now we have the advent of disposable people. What is this world coming to?
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First, a disposable society filled with disposable good. Now we have the advent of disposable people. What is this world coming to?
Just wanted to point out that an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation specifically covered the possibility of disposable people in "The Measure Of A Man" although it had nothing to do with state assisted suicide.
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It's an option. It can only be initiated by the person themselves, you can't tell someone to kill themselves. Even if you have power of attorney and ability to make medical decisions, it can only be done by the request of the person themselves.
And that request will need to be followed by an evaluation on whether that decision was made while the patie
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I get that mental illness treatment is expensive and Canada has a welfare state which they are running out of money to fund but it seems really callous to kill off the mentally ill. Society should be willing to bite the bullet and pay for mental asylums.
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Mentally ill by definition cant make decisions for themselves
Mental illness isn't a blanket condition like that.
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I've hears second-hand stories of (serious) alcoholics that don't want to stop drinking even though they know it is killing them. They are candidates for MAiD in that it is a decision they can make and take control of rather than the slow painful death that multiple organ failure leads to.
I don't want to judge either side of the equation on this one. Saying it is complicated is an understatement. End-of-life decisions are inevitably no-win or at least easy to second guess.
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Re: Well, that's barbaric (Score:2)
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Here's the problem,
By even having MAID as an option for anyone, but limiting it to only a small fraction, it got challenged as discriminatory. So it had to be opened up.
This has caused two things to happen.
Drug-addicts and pro-suicide propaganda to basically suggest "You have nothing to live for, you should die"
And the people who run medical practices to suggest or hint that "MAID is an option" rather than being treated.
That last bit? Is something that we should never got to. Someone who has a chronic medic
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Literally, it took less than 10 years for Canada's euthanasia policy to go from "our seniors deserve to end their suffering on their terms" to euthanasia on-demand for anyone that wants it, including the poor and mentally ill. And of course the government has a conflict of interest seeing that they have socialized healthcare: the same government that is supposed to be spending money on keeping people alive offers suicide as a cheap alternative! Maybe save a few bucks that way! Even if it's only the appearan
Re: Well, that's barbaric (Score:2)
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Insightful)
I dunno.
You get people who have problems with drugs and wind up destroying themselves and their own communities.
Not having a lot of love for people like that is NOT THE SAME THING as wishing them DEAD moron.
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There is nothing in giving them the choice that requires wishing they make one choice or the other.
You're so high you're just shouting and waving your hands in the air.
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Not "having a whole lot of love for" people struggling with mental health, is a weird fucking thing to say, you fucking freak
Apparently (pun intended) you don't have a whole lot of love either.
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Context isn't your strong suit, eh?
Nobody is confused over context. You exposed your own hypocrisy all by yourself and now you'll have to live with it. It is possible to disagree and express a different opinion or perspective without resorting to calling people you don't know a "fucking freak".
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All 300m+ Americans are the same.
Everyone in your country is the same, too, right?
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Insightful)
Hey man, I'm a big lefty that believes in helping others whenever we can.
That said, you going into full blast mode aint helping convince anyone's heart or mind.
Like sure, many drug addicts are victims like all people who have been caught in a cycle of abusing a vice due to various reasons, but if grasshoppa's main crime was just to say he doesn't have a "whole lot of love for" them but doesn't agree with how the government is treating them, you need to calm down.
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As well, there is a growing accumulation of narrative accounts detailing people getting MAiD [medical assistance in dying] due to suffering associated with a lack of access to medical, disability, and social support. [....] The Canadian MAiD regime is lacking the safeguards, data collection, and oversight necessary to protect Canadians against premature death.
https://www.cambridge.org/core... [cambridge.org]
Canada doesn't even have death panels. They have death sole practitioners, apparently, who pressure Canada's armed services veterans to kill themselves rather than seek the medical care they are entitled to.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politi... [www.cbc.ca]
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Canada doesn't even have death panels. They have death sole practitioners, apparently, who pressure Canada's armed services veterans to kill themselves rather than seek the medical care they are entitled to.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politi [www.cbc.ca]... [www.cbc.ca]
So let me get this straight, the fact that a lone case worker went rogue and offered euthanasia to few vets means that the whole system is bad? Give me a break with your wild exaggerations. If the system is truly bad you shouldnt have to make wild claims like these that arent even supported by your citations.
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:4, Insightful)
Try less sarcasm and more actual commentary. You might find that it's possible that two different things ("our support systems could be better" and "our death panels are making things worse") are both true.
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Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Insightful)
Their struggles don't affect just them dumb dumb.
That's not it. Lots of illnesses don't just affect the ill person. We have to make accommodations for people with disabilities and long term health problems.
The reason people hate drug addicts is that they blame the addict for their condition. They think it was a personal failing to get addicted in the first place. We see similar attitudes towards people who contract HIV.
That's why we keep failing to deal with drug addiction problems. We need to treat it like any other illness, and treat it medically rather than criminally.
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't hear about cases of people with cancer / hiv / diabetes stealing all the copper wire and electric fixtures out of a home.
Make their medication illegal, multiply the price by 5 and make them pay for it themselves and you'll see these people do just that.
Wanting to survive can be a pretty powerful motivator to not give a fuck about the legality of doing so.
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Your point was pants on head retarded so someone was trying to do you a solid and make some sense of it. It didn't work, but you should thank them.
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He has a point. Drug addicts made their bed with bad decisions. Choosing not to blame them for the crimes they commit in order to fuel their addiction is a moron's argument.
It's not my job to force them to start making good decisions. What value is it to society anyways vs just having them gone? It's not that I don't care, there is just a whole lot of other things to care about. Nobody is forcing them to kill themselves. If a stranger wants to un-alive themselves, then where is the problem? Is the problem y
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Well, except for the ones generated by the pharma industry with their blanket prescriptions of opioids.
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Insightful)
For a few people with bad impulse control we have forced thousands who need the pain meds to go to the unregulated black market which means they are getting drugs laced with Fentanyl and dying of overdoses while trying to treat their chronic pain. Most of the deaths from the opiod epidemic happened after Oxycodone was demonized and pain treatment was taken out of the hands of doctors and handed over to drug cartels.
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Informative)
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The way I see it, as an outsider, this can only be a trojan move. You're spot on, there's nothing humane in it. It's cutting bottom off any safety net.
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Can we stop with the demonization of pain treatment.
It's not the pain treatment that is demonized. It's the immoral industry and network of immoral medical practitioners that are demonized. Because, frankly, many of them are just selfish assholes that deserve to be removed from the human gene pool.
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:5, Informative)
Can we stop with the demonization of pain treatment.
It's not the pain treatment that is demonized. It's the immoral industry and network of immoral medical practitioners that are demonized. Because, frankly, many of them are just selfish assholes that deserve to be removed from the human gene pool.
It sure as hell is demonization of pain treatment. My SO had shoulder replacement surgery, when we came home the next morning, and the Pharmacy refused to give me the prescription, so she had to wobble in almost falling several times, so she could give them her ID. For her prescription. They felt shitty about it, but I probably tempered that feeling by telling them they'd be in court if she fell on the way out.
Then her doctor read her the riot act about drug testing and her arrest if she was found to be abusing her later Vicodin prescription.
Sure as hell sounds like demonization to me. Meanwhile - that fentanyl that is killing people is just out there, and has nothing to do with any prescription.
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We can stop demonizing it when it stops being the demon.
Germany has more prescriptions of Fentanyl per capita, but Germany has no Fentanyl problem. What does that tell you? That people in the US are weak-willed sheep who can't handle addictive drugs? Or that the whole prescription process in the US is out of whack because nobody gives a shit when doctors create junkies?
Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:4, Interesting)
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Jordan Peterson got addicted to benzodiazepines that he was prescribed for mental health issues. I'm not sure it was really a bad decision on his part, or at the very least that he deserves all the blame.
His addiction was so bad that he went to Russia for a treatment that is not allowed in Canada due to it being dangerous. Basically put in a medically induced coma while he went through withdrawal. Caused some brain damage, according to his daughter. Not every addict has access to that though.
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Re:Well, that's barbaric (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, I don't know about your country (or peers), in mine, smoking isn't that big a deal. Or, rather, it wasn't when I was a kid. Everyone did it. Peer pressure in this context is pretty easy.
If you compare that with shooting something you got from some shady guy in a dark alley into your vein... erh... well, no. It's not even in the same ballpark. That ain't something you just "try out, maybe you like it". We're talking about putting a fucking needle into your own vein and injecting something in it.
And if you think that's bad, google for crocodile. The drug. Desomorphine. I recommend not doing a picture search. There's a reason pretty much ALL pictures you could find in google with these keywords are blurred. That shit not only kills you but destroys you. It's public knowledge. We're not talking about "oh, if you're careful and you know where you get it...". No. That shit fucking DESTROYS your body, and the people using it effin' KNOW that.
We're not talking smoking, something that might kill you somewhere down the line of 30, 40 or 50 years. Hell, there are people past their 90s who have been smokers all their life and they're still alive. Sure, there are others like my mom who die before retirement. But that's something where you might consider gambling. These things kill you for absolutely sure within the next 5 years, and you'll be in unbelievable pain for the last few days of your life.
And these people fucking know that.
Can you imagine just how completely shit your life has to be that you say "Ok. Accepted. Now shoot that crap into me"?
Nazis (Score:4, Insightful)
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MALD would be funnier at least.
Re: Nazis (Score:4, Insightful)
Didn't have that one on my bingo card (Score:3, Interesting)
Canada is the last place I would've expected to essentially say "if you can't be a productive member of our society, here's an exit bag." Though to be honest, I kind of suspected it to be more likely that humanity would begin to normalize suicide rather than create some sort of post-scarcity utopian society. It's a lot cheaper.
Re: Didn't have that one on my bingo card (Score:3, Insightful)
Welcome to government-run healthcare. Canada has a very long history of using its government medical system to forcibly sterilize or murder natives, undesired and recently giving this as an option to anyone needing long term treatment.
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That is Satan for you. He always says this time it will be different, I am here to help honest. Its always eugenics, death, and waste in the end.
This time the lie is "dignity for suffering addicts" the truth of course is "exterminate the poor".
"we have nearly eliminated downs' ", yeah by murdering the afflicted.
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Assisted suicide exists in many countries, but normally only for people who have an incurable disease and are sane of mind, the reasoning is to allow them to die without having to go through the pointless final suffering. This is mostly meant for people with incurable cancer and similar diseases to give them a decent death which is unavoidable anyway. And then there is sweden which killed old people in 2020 who caught covid by denying them a proper treatment and instead giving them opioids as final exit wit
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I think it is very humane. It is offering them something different than an overdose.
There is a bad drawback emerging these days though. Government reduced payments to people with disabilities. Some of them chose death as a consequence. That is a scary evolution.
Just as a test (Score:4, Interesting)
They should give one group of these people a income of $350k for a couple of years and see if they still want to kill themselves afterwards. I'll bet a lot of them are miserable because life is a hopeless slog, and if presented with a comfortable, stress-free living for a while they'd find it SO much easier to quit drugs and get back into a healthy life.
Re:Just as a test (Score:5, Insightful)
They should give one group of these people a income of $350k for a couple of years and see if they still want to kill themselves afterwards.
Or they'd buy $350k worth of drugs and OD anyway.
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I live in a, by American standards, very socialist country, so a lot needs to go wrong before you end up on the streets
That's very relevant. Essentially, your country is already doing this experiment all the time, and the only people who actually end up homeless there are the ones where the extra money doesn't help. It'd be reasonable to expect that targetting those people specifically with extra money wouldn't help.
The situation in America is... very different, and I suspect Canada isn't that much better.
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How about you offer to give them half your income for a few years? I mean, you're so concerned so what's the problem with that? I mean, that is your suggested solution, except I bet you want someone else to pay the bill.
I'd rather not be a slave for these people so that they can live a cushy life for free while I work hard to enjoy mine. That will hurt my own mental health. If I heard that I could get a freebee $350k for a few years, well, yeah I got problems too. How do I get in on it? That's probably 7-8
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Well, human compassion is a thing that some people feel. Sure there are cause and effect aspects to wealth, but there are also a number of things outside an individual's personal control.
But, the theme of throwing people away when they cease to be useful has made for a few good stories over the years... it is something to be careful of as a society.
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If people WANT to kill themselves there are plenty of ways to do that. The truth is most people don't want to kill themselves. The truth is there is a gulf between not being part of the solution and being part of the problem. Yes evil prevails when enough good men practice apathy, but when good men throw in with wickedness they are no longer good men and you need even more good men to counter it. We can't all fight every battle, you don't have to be part of the solution but you should try to not be part
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The number of well off actors and athletes who get into drug problems would seem to contradict that argument.
Letting the druggies terminate themselves if partly cost reduction given ER expenses and treatment costs, and partly cold-blooded eugenics. Remove the addictable gene from the species.
Still, as was pointed out above, having this show up in Canada is a bit of a surprise.
My heart just sank (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a Canadian, and what I just read hurts me. In my country there have been scandals around medically assisted dying, both in prisons [msn.com] and among veterans [www.cbc.ca] And now this. It makes me sad, and it makes me angry.
I've long been in favour of Medically Assisted Dying. I guess I was naive; even though I often kind of expect the worst of people just based on life experience, it honestly never occurred to me that the concept would be abused in this way. I anticipated greedy family members pushing for medically assisted death in order to get their hands on insurance and inheritance money, but it just never occurred to me that the abuse would be institutionalized by my own fucking government, based on the cold calculus of mere fucking convenience.
I totally support death with dignity, and helping people bypass incredible pain and suffering which will end in death anyway. But I will not stand for encouraging people to end their lives because it's too inconvenient - or too costly, whatever the fuck that means - to help them make the remainder of their natural lives worth living. I'm pissed, and I'm on the verge of tears. Fuck my government, and fuck the brand of political correctness and wokeness that allows people to get away with saying that this shit is OK and thinking they can turn their heads away as though there's nothing important to see.
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Your link to the article about prisons isn't about killing prisoners... it's about prisoners being denied the right to end their lives, the exact opposite of what you're worried about.
Your link to the article about veterans isn't about killing them either, it's about a single government employee who inappropriately made the suggestion and was caught at it.
We're doing OK. If there are people tortured by addiction or mental illness who want a dignified exit, we shouldn't be casual about it, but they shouldn'
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" or too costly, whatever the fuck that means "
Expected cost of treatment exceeds expected future tax revenue.
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OK you're a moron.
You post two articles which say the opposite of what you claim, then blame it all on "woke".
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To everyone below who pointed out the error of my ways, and everyone else who noticed them but didn't comment: Yup, mea culpa - I was an idiot and a moron, I let myself get wound up, went off half-cocked, and shot from the hip. My apologies - I wish I could post a 'shame-faced' emoji.
Who needs it? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Yes, by definition, but do-gooders keep showing up with Narcan to save them. Maybe they need a DNR bracelet.
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Don't most people with substance abuse problems already have access to enough drugs to kill themselves?
Ironically, they usually have just enough to harm themselves and kill other innocent victims.
See drunk/drugged driving statistics and don't be so naive.
I don't know what I think about this (Score:4, Insightful)
As a resident of Nova Scotia (Mentioned in this article) fI can tell you the ability to treat mental health is a problem.
The medical situation in Nova Scotia is a problem generally speaking. Personally been on the "family doctor waiting list" for more than 7 years. I've personally in the past needed mental health assistance, and been told after being registered, that it would be a minimum of 6 months to a year for an intake, to assess my need, to then find a practitioner and then be put on the waiting list for an appointment. And it was recommended that if I could afford to personally pay for such assistance, I could probably get in sooner.
The number of people that go untreated in Nova Scotia, and sadly take their own lives is staggering. And I don't have the actual numbers in front of me, I just know it's talked about on talk radio enough, and through my own personal interactions, people talk about it. In the last 4 years, I personally lost 4 friends to suicide.
As a Nova Scotian, the hardest thing about reading this, is it almost sounds like they are just putting a name to it. I wonder if as many people would meet the classification of being assisted with dying, if they could just get more people in the province to help them before it got that bad.
Not my proudest post, but I am human, and this one... well, if you lived here you would probably agree with at least some of what I'm saying.
No to Widening Criteria. (Score:2)
There is no reason to provide medical assistance in dying unless an individual is not capable of killing himself--for example bedridden or otherwise heavily physically disabled. For the mentally disabled or drug addicts who don't have those physical problems this would only be true if they are institutionalized. And if they are in such bad shape that they are institutionalized one wonders if they really have the mental capacity to make such a decision. For the average drug addict all he needs to do is buy s
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There is no reason to provide medical assistance in dying
What if they don't know what they are doing? And don't want to live out the rest of their long life as a vegetable? Or, worse yet, use some method that turns out to be horribly painful and long and drawn out?
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If you've already alienated your family due to addiction, you could be a rotting corpse for months and leaving a mess for the landlord to deal with when they finally try to evict you. If you don't do it at home, someone is likely to come along and try to be the hero. I wouldn't say there's an overall good option.
What Sickness Is Next? (Score:2)
I cut my finger. Time to end it all. Gimme some death acid in the vein, please. Thanks!
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Sure, if that's the treatment you want to choose, I say let you.
And if you just want a bandage, that should also be available.
Suicide shouldn't be illegal (Score:2)
Not cheerleading for depression or rash decisions here, but at the opposite extreme, forcing people to continue to suffer isn't compassionate or moral by any morality I recognize.
The rest is just details.
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Christian or Muslim morality .
Sounds like an oxymoron to me.
condemn themselves to an eternity of suffering.
What are you on? Let me know so I can stay clear of it.
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Nope. (Score:2)
My ten foot pole lies untouched in the other room.
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If you think you're going to keep these people alive just to have them touch your 10 foot pole...
Next, the poor! (Score:3, Informative)
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>"Liberals get freedom to choose, conservatives get freedom to kill"
That is a ridiculous "definition" of conservatism if ever I heard one. How about:
Liberals get freedom to choose to take everyone else's resources, conservatives get freedom to help others help themselves by trying to hold them responsible for their own decisions.
I am sure that will be just as popular.
Struggling with addiction in Canada?⦠(Score:2)
Seriously what the fuck Canada? This is evil, barbaric, and cruel.
Not the best messaging (Score:2)
statement in federal law that some people aren't really human.
So, this asshole zombie doesn't think terminal cancer patients who can already access the program are human?
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Could you not just read the 4 words of context before the quoted portion?
Dark territory. (Score:3)
Addiction is a disease which kills (Score:2)
Any addict will take the option of euthanasia over treatment. They view the world as a place which doesn't want them and it's completely evil, so why live? That's the whole reason they're addicted. They're running away from pain. Having the option of an easy death open to them, will result in thousands upon thousands of addicts applying for this, as opposed to looking for recovery. To them, death is the easy way out.
I never expected such idiocy from the Canadian government. Here's for hoping the WHO will st
Stupid activists (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes they are.
Last time a nation introduced those it came complete with secret police, removal of individual freedoms and labor camps.
Can you at least admit that we were right? (Score:3, Insightful)
We primitive religious types said that there was no way that it was going to stop with people who were painfully dying ... it was going to grow, and grow, and grow.
"There's no slippery slope!" - you cried, as you zoomed down past us in your toboggans ...
Housing Crisis (Score:3)
This is obviously part of the Trudeau governments new strategy to solve the housing crisis in Canada.
Re: T4 vibe (Score:3)
Canada has plenty of history, people that arenâ(TM)t mentally competent, underage, elderly or natives being forced or tricked into euthanasia or eugenics programs. There is a âscandalâ(TM) every few years about groups of people being murdered by the state, but nothing ever changes, they have to save money somehow.
Re: (Score:2)
Sure... Canada has a history with eugenics (sterilization). Along with the United States, Germany, Great Britain, Brazil, Japan, Sweden...
But Canada does not have a history of tricking people into euthanasia. If you're going to be that accusatory, back it up please.
I have no idea why you think it would save anybody any money. Whatever oddball set of connections you have going on in your brain, that's your problem. Not Canada's.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Why would I do that? And more to the point, what makes you think ANYBODY is doing that? I mean... except for you.
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, let me explain better. Given the small number of times this might actually be approved, even given the costs you "save", when you add up the cost of legislation, litigation, public engagement, and administration, you will not save money. And nobody involved thinks it will.
You're just putting another straw man "death panel" in the discourse.
Re: (Score:3)