Bill C-7 has created ethical tensions between MAID providers and palliative care, between transparency and patient privacy, and between offering a dignified death rather than a dignified life.
Dutch Health Minister Ernst Kuipers announced that new regulations are being drafted to extend euthanasia to terminally ill children aged one to 12.
Pro Shots/Alamy Stock Photo
New regulations are being drafted in the Netherlands to allow euthanasia for a small group of children aged one to 12 for whom palliative care is not sufficient.
The Convalescent – Carolus-Duran (1860).
Musée d'Orsay/Public Domain
With euthanasia laws proliferating around the world, Caitlin Mahar’s The Good Death Through Time is a valuable exploration of the history of our shifting views on dying well.
It’s been a long time coming. But this latest news means the ACT and NT could draw up their own voluntary assisted dying laws, bringing them into line with the states.
House of Representatives members arrive in the Senate chamber during the opening of parliament last month.
Mick Tsikas/AAP
Tony Burke once worked hard to stop euthanasia becoming law in the Northern Territory. Now, he must usher through a new bill to allow the territories to debate the issue.
Several factors ranging from personal spiritual beliefs to patient relationships to medical legal issues can influence whether a health-care practitioner participates in providing medical assistance in dying (MAID).
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For people to access medical assistance in dying (MAID) requires health-care professionals willing to provide the service. The reasons health-care providers choose not to participate are important.
Ben White, Queensland University of Technology; Lindy Willmott, Queensland University of Technology, and Marcus Sellars, Australian National University
Interviews with 32 doctors who provided voluntary assisted dying services in Victoria found layers of bureaucracy made it difficult for patients to access the system. Some died while waiting.
Ben White, Queensland University of Technology and Lindy Willmott, Queensland University of Technology
Draft legislation which would see voluntary assisted dying allowed in Queensland will be introduced into the state’s parliament next week. So how does the proposed law compare to other states?
Bill C-7 seeks to expand access to medical assistance in dying (MAID) to people who are not terminally ill, including those who suffer solely from mental illness.
(Pixabay)
The fundamental underpinning of all MAID requests is supposed to be the presence of an incurable medical condition, but it’s not possible to predict that a mental illness will not improve.
Assisted dying is often cast as an issue of individual autonomy, but an assisted death can have repercussions on many people — those left behind or others struggling with a chronic disease.
Over the first year of voluntary assisted dying in Victoria, about 400 people applied to access the laws to end their lives. There are lingering issues, but the system is workable.