Medical Assistance in Dying
Canada's Voluntary Euthanasia Program
Medical Assistance in Dying is Canada's voluntary medical euthanasia program. It is summarized as follows:
Two Tracks
Track 1
Death Reasonably Foreseeable
Track 2
Death Not Reasonably Foreseeable
Cost
Covered by Canadian public healthcare. Functionally free for Canadians.
Requirements
(a) (...) incurable illness, disease or disability
(b) (...) decline in capability; and
(c) (...) suffering that is intolerable to them and that cannot be relieved under conditions that they consider acceptable.
Safeguard
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Two independent assessments by qualified medical professionals
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Each assessor is mandated to refer viable alternatives
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Viable alternatives may include healthcare options, community resources for housing or poverty relief, or other resources
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The lack of viable alternatives is the basis for the validation that an applicant's suffering is "irremediable" and qualifies for MAiD
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The existence of a viable alternative is insufficient. It must be practically achievable and acceptable to the applicant.
The Problem
In practice, MAiD allows for cases whose applicant is qualified by having a medical condition or disability but whose suffering arises from unmet needs such as food, housing, or medical treatment, whose access is economically blocked.
This is Economic or Poverty-Driven Euthanasia
Provincial and federal social disability support programs place recipients into official ‘Deep Poverty’ lines. These are almost universally insufficient for basic essentials, creating suffering that can combine with the cross-eligibility between these programs and MAiD.
This structurally produces a non-zero rate of economic euthanasia amongst Canadians with disabilities.
This is Economic Disability Euthanasia
Economic Disability Euthanasia
Modern Canadian Timeline
Individual Enters Social Disability Program
Impoverishment
Critical Need Event or Accumulation
Hopelessness, Futility, Suicide and MAiD
A life event or natural progression leads a person to government disability support, which becomes their primary source of income
Because of asset caps, clawbacks, and other punitive program rules, the person is slowly drained of savings and forced into month‑to‑month survival
An individual encounters, or gradually accumulates, a set of unmet needs—minor or urgent—that place them in suffering, and they are economically unable to obtain relief.
When suffering becomes unbearable or a constant part of daily life, and attempts to navigate the social system prove unfruitful, thoughts of suicide or MAiD may emerge.
Case Study
‘Sophia’ was a 51-year old woman living with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity. She enjoyed knitting, belonged to a women’s knitting group and made stuffed animals for children in women’s shelters.
Unfortunately, she lived in unsupportive social housing. The shared HVAC system triggered her condition by circulating chemical vapours from other units. She was confined to a makeshift sealed bedroom, which she described as a ‘dungeon’. For two years, she pleaded for help finding new housing, reaching out out to organizations, local government and parliament.
After no results, and still suffering immensely, she applied for MAiD.
Close to the MAiD date, her doctors wrote to the government:
“Because of her unrelieved suffering in Rent Geared to Income (RGI) housing, a patient (R.W.) has applied for and been found eligible for Medical Assistance in Dying, which she intends to follow through on before Christmas this year. We physicians find it unconscionable that no other solution is proposed to this situation, other than Medical Assistance in Dying. We urge you to do something and communicate with us as quickly as possible.”
Sophia passed away from MAiD on Feb 2, 2022
The problem and our
solution
Business Model.
MAiD assessors are duty-bound to refer ‘viable alternatives’ to MAiD.
If no viable alternatives exist for an applicant, they must approve.
No specific referrable resource currently exists for economic euthanasia.​
The applicant is approved.
We are referred as a ‘Viable Alternative’.​
Our frontline agent sits down with a client and creates a solution proposal.
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This proposal is submitted for internal review and underwriting approval.
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The approved proposal is backed with the necessary capital and executed.
