MAID in Canada: The Right to Die
America’s culture war over the question of when human life begins has been joined by those who want to reshape how human life ends.
The debate over legalizing physician-assisted suicide began in Oregon nearly thirty years ago. The scheme, in which doctors prescribe lethal drugs and guidance for patients who want to end their lives, was sold to the public as “death with dignity” and carefully restricted to individuals 18 and older who had an incurable and irreversible terminal illness and were not expected to live beyond six months. This novel approach to end-of-life care ran contrary to laws in all 50 states that made it a crime to assist a fellow human being in committing suicide. For physicians, it undermined the age-old Hippocratic Oath provision: “Neither will I administer a poison to anybody when asked to do so, nor will I suggest such a course.”
