In Belgium, a pair of 45-year-old twins decided to seek the aid of doctors in ending their own lives.
They were born deaf, and made a living together as cobblers. Upon learning that they were both going blind as well, they wanted to end their suffering before it could truly begin. Holland and Belgium are the first countries in the world to legally support euthanasia and physician-assisted death, but they won’t be the last.
For the first time in Canadian history, there are more people over the age of 65 than there are under the age of 15. As boomers continue to settle into retirement age, late-stage diseases will become a sad reality for a larger amount of the population. It’s time truly examine the “right to die” debate, because it will only become more relevant over time.
The legal difference between “euthanasia” and “physician-assisted death” is slight but crucial. The Belgian doctors at Brussels University Hospital performed euthanasia, where the entire process of administering a lethal dosage to a willing patient is carried out by another person. This can be met with a murder charge in Canada (and it has been in the past).
Physician-assisted death is what Dr. Jack Kevorkian was arrested for conducting; a physician shows the patient how to administer a dose, and possibly even sets up the procedure for them, but lets them make the final call and push the button. Both are illegal in Canada, but a mixed group of advocates and people with degenerative diseases have been fighting for years to have physician-assisted death made legal.
The most recent and notable break in the federal ban on physician-assisted death was the case of Gloria Taylor, a B.C. woman who was diagnosed with ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s Disease. In 2011, Taylor was granted the personal right to a physician-assisted death by the B.C. Supreme Court. The decision was tabled for a year, and the federal government ordered the ruling reversed, but Taylor’s right was enforced, and she passed away due to ALS-related symptoms in the fall.
The reality of this issue is that if someone wants to die on their own terms, the government is hard-pressed to stop them. Assisted deaths already occur, but everyone involved has the clandestine air of criminals. Technically, they are criminals. Currently, someone wanting to die on their own terms has to be quickly ushered out of this life for fear of criminal charges, and any loved ones who help them could be charged after the fact. It’s a horrible concern to be burdened with, yet it happens with increasing regularity.
One of the truest, and arguably greatest, freedoms we can offer someone is the power to end their life on their own terms. If an individual is of sound enough mind and body to make the mature decision to call it a day, by what reasonable right can our government refuse them their last request? This is not some sort of Logan’s Run-esque dystopia, where death squads enforce a mandatory death age (although some writers may try to convince you this is the case). This is simply a matter of not making it a crime to end a spiral of suffering that cannot be reversed.
As famous British novelist Terry Pratchett (recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s himself) put it, what people fear is not death, so much as a “bad death.” The loss of themselves and the things they made their life their own. We currently force Canadians to accept whatever type of death finds them, even if it’s a protracted, degenerative one that can be seen coming a mile away.
Statistically speaking, this debate will arrive on more doorsteps with each passing year. The questions are clear: Do Canadians deserve to wait, or choose? Were those Belgian doctors doing a service, a committing a crime? The consequences for avoiding this national discussion can be counted in lives, every single day.
National Post