Canada sees surge in MAID deaths

Experts divided over country's emergence as global leader in controversial end-of-life treatment

- ROBERT CRIBB, MASIH KHALATBARI

Toronto psychiatrist Dr. Cheryl Rowe believes patients have a right to die a dignified death. “Who am I to say you’re suffering, it’s too bad, you just have to find a way to live like this?”

The number of Canadians ending their lives through medically assisted death has grown at a speed that outpaces every other nation in the world.

As Canada is poised to expand eligibility criteria under medical assistance in dying (MAID) legislation, data from all 11 countries where the controversial end-of-life treatment exists shows Canada is the fastest-growing adopter in history, an analysis by the Investigative Journalism Bureau and the Toronto Star has found.

Some experts see the rapid growth as a human rights triumph that allows Canadians to make their own choice about when they wish to die with the full support of the state and their doctors. Others fear that failures in the health-care system and social safety net may be contributing to the surge.

Assisted deaths accounted for four per cent of all deaths in Canada in 2022 — up from one per cent in 2017, the first full year the legislation was in place. The number of MAID deaths quadrupled during that time. In 2022, the total number hit 13,000 nationwide — a 31 per cent jump from the previous year.

In the past two years alone, more people have died under Canada’s assisted death regime than in any other nation in the world, the IJB/ Star analysis shows.

“We’ve gone in a trajectory that no other country on the planet has gone,” says Dr. Sonu Gaind, chief of psychiatry at Sunnybrook Hospital. “We don’t know what the full impact is going to be.”

Canada poised to lead world in MAID deaths