here - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

N u m b e r 157 December 2014
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
challenges Québec’s euthanasia law
By Hugh Scher – EPC Legal Counsel
Québec’s landmark law allowing
euthanasia contravenes Canadian
criminal homicide laws and represents a dangerous step towards
a patchwork quilt of provincial
regulation of serious criminal conduct, which is why the issue must
be handled federally, says Toronto
health, human rights and constitutional lawyer Hugh Scher.
The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition (EPC), represented
by Scher, was granted leave to intervene in a constitutional challenge brought by the Physicians Alliance Against
Euthanasia and Vivre Dans La Dignite, Living With Dignity, against both the federal and Québec provincial governments arguing Québec’s law, which was adopted last
summer and will go into effect in December 2015, is stepping on federal jurisdiction by undercutting sections of the
Criminal Code that outlaw assisted
suicide and euthanasia and by attempting to define the intentional
killing of patients by doctors as
healthcare.
The proposed safeguards in the
law are discriminatory and violate ss. 7 and 15 of the Charter of
Rights and Freedoms, says an affidavit filed by the Coalition.
“Any change to decriminalize
euthanasia is properly the jurisdiction of the Parliament of Canada, as it is in its
pith and substance a question of criminal law,” says
the court document. “The federal law is and should be
paramount in order to ensure certainty, universality
and equal benefit and protection of the criminal law
across Canada.”
See Québec page 4 ...
East Coast Conference Against Assisted Suicide - Big Success!
November 21 – 22 near Hartford, Connecticut, EPC successfully co-sponsored the East Coast Conference Against
Assisted Suicide.
During the 2014 legislative session, assisted suicide
bills were debated in Connecticut, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and New Jersey. Assisted suicide was legalized
in Vermont in 2013. In New Jersey, assisted suicide Bill
A2270 passed in the New Jersey legislature on November
13 and it is scheduled to be debated in the New Jersey Senate in December.
The timing of the East Coast Conference was important
as the eastern US states get ready to defeat assisted suicide bills on a state by state basis. The Associated Press
reported that:
Organizers say about 140 people have turned out today for a conference on assisted suicide.
The two-day event, dubbed East Coast Against Assisted
Suicide, was wrapping up on Saturday in Windsor Locks.
It was sponsored by several groups that oppose legalizing the practice, including the Connecticut-based
Family Institute of Connecticut and Second Thoughts
Connecticut.
Other sponsors included the Euthanasia Prevention
Coalition and Second Thoughts Massachusetts.
Speakers included experts from the region and around
the world who oppose assisted suicide legislation in
the U.S., particularly the East Coast.
Last year marked the second straight year that a Connecticut legislative committee held a public hearing on
legislation allowing physicians to prescribe medication to help terminally ill patients end their lives. The
bill was not brought up for a vote.
The East Coast Conference Against Assisted Suicide
was an incredible success. It was organized to train
people from all political and social points of view to
understand the issues related to assisted suicide and to
effectively oppose it in their state.
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Assisted Suicide: Is there a
suicide contagion effect?
By Margaret Dore
It is well established that a single suicide
can encourage other suicides, which is called
a “suicide contagion.” If the additional suicides use the same method, they are “copy
cat” suicides. Moreover, as explained below,
this encouragement phenomenon is relevant
to Compassion & Choices’ media campaign.
The media campaign by Compassion &
Choices, to promote the suicide of Ms. Maynard, violated and continues to violate all of
these suicide prevention guidelines. We were
told of the planned method, when and where
it would take place and who would be there.
There was and is repeated extensive coverage
in multiple media. With this situation, the risk
of suicide contagion associated with Compassion & Choices’ media campaign is real.
A famous example of a suicide contagion is
the suicide death of Marilyn Monroe, which
inspired an increase in other suicides. This
Moreover, in Oregon, where Compasencouragement phenomenon can also occur
sion & Choices has already run similar, but
Margaret Dore
when the inspiring death is not a suicide. An
smaller media promotions, there is statistical
example is the televised execution of Saddam
evidence suggesting, but not proving, a suicide
Hussein, which led to suicide deaths of children
contagion.
worldwide. An NBC News article begins:
In Oregon’s most recent regular suicide report, the fi“The boys’ deaths - scattered in the United States, in
nancial
cost of these other (regular) suicides is huge. The
Yemen, in Turkey and elsewhere in seemingly isolated
report
on
page 3 elaborates:
horror - had one thing in common: They hanged themselves after watching televised images of Saddam Hus“The cost of suicide is enormous. In 2010 alone, selfseins’ execution.”
inflicted injury hospitalization charges exceeded 41
million dollars; and the estimate of total lifetime cost of
Groups such as the National Institute of Health and the
suicide in Oregon was over 680 million dollars.”
World Health Organization have developed guidelines
for reporting suicide to prevent suicide contagions. ImOregon is the only state where there has been legalizaportant points include that the risk of additional suicides tion of assisted suicide long enough to have statistics over
increases “when the story explicitly describes the suicide time. The enormous cost of increased (regular) suicides
method, uses dramatic/graphic headlines or images, and in Oregon, positively correlated to physician-assisted
repeated/extensive coverage.”
suicide legalization and is a significant factor to consider
when states, such as New Jersey, consider legalizing asPlease consider the following:
sisted suicide.
• Oregon’s physician-assisted suicide law went into
effect in 1998.
• By 2000, Oregon’s regular suicide rate was “increasing significantly” See (“After decreasing in the
1990s, suicide rates have been increasing significantly since 2000”).
• By 2007, Oregon’s other (regular) suicide rate was
35% above the national average.
• By 2010, Oregon’s other (regular) suicide rate was
41% above the national average.
• By 2013 (Center for Disease control) Oregon’s other
(regular) suicide rate was 49% above the national
average.
2
Margaret Dore is an attorney in Washington State
where assisted suicide is legal. She is a former Law Clerk
to the Washington State Supreme Court. She is President
of Choice is an Illusion, a nonprofit corporation. Choice is
an Illusion welcomes everyone opposed to assisted suicide
and euthanasia regardless of your views on other issues.
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition Newsletter – 157 – december 2014
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie needs
to veto the assisted suicide bill
Likely, the New Jersey Governor Chris Christie
will need to veto the state assisted suicide bill.
The New Jersey media reported that Stephen
Sweeney (D), the President of the New Jersey State
Senate, agreed to be the primary sponsor for New
Jersey Senate Assisted Suicide Bill 382, after Joseph
Vitale (D) withdrew his sponsorship of the bill.
Vitale, the Chairman of the State Senate Health
Committee, told the New Jersey media:
“I initially supported the idea of the bill and signed
on. After a time, I had more questions and concerns
than answers. So I thought it was honest to remove my
name and continue to think about it.”
On Nov 13, after pushing for a quick vote on the
assisted suicide Bill A2270, while the Brittany Maynard’s story was in the minds of the state legislators,
the New Jersey State Assembly passed this bill by a
vote of 41 to 31.
Last June, Nancy Elliott,
a member of the Euthanasia
Prevention Coalition International Board spoke with
Christie and she reported that:
“I had the opportunity to speak
with Governor Chris Christie
from New Jersey. I know that a
lot of you are concerned about
the assisted suicide bill that
passed the Health CommitChris Christie
tee in New Jersey. He assured
me vehemently that he has not
changed his position on assisted suicide, that he would
veto it if it came to his desk and that as long as he was
the Governor of New Jersey this was not going to become law.”
New Jersey citizens are urged to contact their state
senators to defeat the assisted suicide bill.
Euthanasia is not medical treatment
On November 6 – the Coalition of Physicians for Social
Justice in Québec organized a dinner to raise money for
the legal challenge to the Québec euthanasia law.
Speakers at the dinner included, among others, Dr Balfour Mount, the founder of Palliative care in North America and Dr Margaret Somerville, the founding director of
the Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law at McGill University.
Dr Mount who is the founder of palliative care and a
cancer survivor stated that euthanasia is not medical aid in
dying. Mount thought that he was providing medical aid in
dying for the past 40 years when practising palliative care
while not killing his patients. Mount said:
“medical aid in dying – what a clever, fog promoting,
cowardly, distortion of the language we see in Bill 52.”
“as humpty dumpty said when I use a word it means
just what I want it to – neither more or less.”
Balfour Mount
With reference to palliative care,
Mount stated that:
“less than one-third of the people who need palliative care have
access to it, that fact is an argument for asking why, not an argument to start killing people.”
Dr Somerville responded to
the critics who say that euthanasia only represents an incremental change, Somerville called
euthanasia ‘a seismic shift in our
foundational values.’ She said:
“For over 2500 years, physicians have never regarded killing
as medical treatment. This is a
pretty radical departure to think
that this is medical treatment.”
Margaret Somerville
Dr Somerville then noted:
“In a post-modern secular society in Canada, the two
institutions that carry the value of respect for human
life are medicine and law. The law says ‘you must not
kill’ and medicine says ‘we care always, we care where
possible and we never kill.”
The Coalition of Physicians for Social Justice and the
Physicians Alliance Against Euthanasia have launched
a legal challenge to the Québec euthanasia law (Bill 52).
The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition has gained intervener
standing in the case.
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition considers the Québec
euthanasia law to be unconstitutional.
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition Newsletter – 157 – december 2014
3
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Switzerland
Germany
A study published by the Swiss Academy of Sciences
found that the majority of Swiss doctors are unwilling to
participate in assisted suicide.
The German Bundestag recently debated the legalization
of assisted suicide. German legislators did not debate a bill
but rather they debated the general issues related to euthanasia and assisted suicide in order to determine the direction of future legislation. The media stated:
An unusual, highly emotional debate in German parliament ended with the majority expressing support for
prohibiting organized assisted suicide. But not all representatives called for an outright ban of the practice.
The Swiss Academy of Sciences sent questionnaires to
4800 Swiss physicians and received only 1318 responses
(27%). The Swiss media reported that:
For the majority of the 1318 respondents, support for
assisted suicide depended on the specific situation: the
more clearly a purely physical and terminal disease is
present, the greater the acceptance of physician-assisted suicide. Three-quarters were opposed to assisted
suicide in the case of people who are old but otherwise
healthy, while over half rejected assisted suicide for patients with mental illness.
The study, also examined physicians’ personal experiences in this area:
Less than half of the respondents had, on at least one
occasion, received a serious request for assisted suicide.
About a quarter had, at least once, evaluated whether the
eligibility criteria for assisted suicide were met. Most of the
physicians concerned have done so rarely, while individual
doctos undertook such an evaluation at least 50 times.
In jurisdictions where assisted suicide is legal, very few
doctors are willing to participate in causing the death of
their patients. Out of the 1318 physicians who responded to
the study, only 111 had participated in an assisted suicide.
The majority of the members were opposed to the assisted suicide business. Volker Kauder (CDU) pointed to a
recent development that he said is a cause for concern:
For organizations that offer assisted suicide services
to their members, he said, it was a “perversion” that,
according to the amount in membership dues paid, assisted suicide services would be provided either immediately, or after a certain waiting period.
“What does that have to do with humanity?” he asked. “Is that something we want to have in our society?”
According to the media, the German Health Minister opposes assisted suicide.
Health Minister Hermann Groehe said he opposed doctor assisting suicide. He said Germany should instead expand its network of hospices, so everyone has access to palliative care and the best painkillers while dying.
...Québec from page 1
Scher recently appeared at the Supreme Court of Canada
on behalf of EPC in Carter v. Canada (Attorney General),
arguing the court should maintain its previous ruling on the
matter in Rodriguez v. British Columbia (Attorney General).
In Rodriguez, the court found s. 241 was not infringing
on certain rights under the Charter, or that any such infringements were justified as there was no halfway measure that could meet Parliament’s legitimate objective to
protect the vulnerable and promote life.
EPC’s core message in the Québec case echos its position
in Carter that the intentional killing of patients by doctors
is wrong and unlawful. The affidavit states:
4
“Euthanasia is not health care, but is instead the antithesis to health care.”
“Legalization of physician-assisted suicide and/or euthanasia would fundamentally alter the very essence of
the doctor-patient relationship in a manner that is contrary to the values and highest traditions of the medical
profession to do no harm and would thwart the importance of intention as a factor that delineates between
criminal conduct and legitimate health care.”
Having been granted intervener status in several cases
dealing with end-of-life issues – including the well-known
Supreme Court matter Cuthbertson v. Rasouli – EPC says
it has “a useful and different perspective” on the subject,
along with special expertise and interest.