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Canadian judge blocks imminent euthanasia death of 27-year-old autistic woman

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

A Canadian judge stopped for now at least the planned euthanasia death of a 27-year-old autistic woman after ruling in favor of her father, who appealed another judge’s decision to allow the woman to go ahead with taking her life despite his objections.

On April 8, Justice Anne Kirker issued a stay of the injunction “pending a determination of an appeal in the case of the 27-year-old autistic Calgary woman whose father has been trying to prevent her death by euthanasia,” as noted by Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

As a result, the woman will not be allowed to die by euthanasia until the Court of Appeal makes a final decision in the case.

Kirker ordered a stay on the injunction to “prevent the death of the 27-year-old autistic woman until after the appeal is heard.”

Schadenberg said that this case “concerns me greatly since I have an autistic son.”

The trial has been tentatively set to start in October. The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition has said that it “will seek to intervene in the Appeal.”

As there is a publication ban in place, the young woman in the case is identified as MV and her father is listed as WV.

Late last month, LifeSiteNews reported that a Calgary judge ruled that the autistic, non-terminally ill young woman could go ahead and be put to death via euthanasia despite objections from her father.

On March 25, Justice Colin C.J. Feasby of the Alberta Court of King’s Bench overturned an injunction sought by the autistic woman’s father, which had previously prevented her from being killed via Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) euthanasia program.

‘Only’ reason the woman was ‘approved’ for euthanasia was because she is ‘autistic’

Schadenberg told LifeSiteNews that the father is “challenging the death of his daughter out of love but also based on justice.”

“He opposes euthanasia, but he also recognizes that his daughter does not have a medical condition that would approve her for being killed,” he said.

He then told LifeSiteNews that the only reason the woman has been approved for euthanasia “is because she is autistic.”

MV was diagnosed with autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). She was approved for MAiD by two doctors.

MV’s father had argued his daughter is vulnerable and “is not competent to make the decision to take her own life.”

Of important note is that MV still lives at home under the care of her parents.

In February, after pushback from pro-life, medical, and mental health groups as well as most of Canada’s provinces, the federal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau delayed its planned expansion of MAiD to those suffering solely from mental illness to 2027.

The number of Canadians killed by lethal injection since 2016 stands at close to 45,000, and many fear that because the official statistics are manipulated the number may be even higher.

Indeed, a recent Statistics Canada update admitted to excluding euthanasia from its death totals despite it being the sixth-highest cause of mortality in the nation.

Last month, LifeSiteNews reported on a new documentary that shines a light on the devastating impact of legal euthanasia in Canada.

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Daily Caller

‘Dark Day’: Another Western Country Backs Doctor-Assisted Suicide, Opens Door To ‘Murder Of Old And Sick’

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Katelynn Richardson

Oxford ethicist Dr. Calum Miller wrote on X the vote was a “huge step towards state-assisted and doctor-assisted murder of old and sick people” in the UK.

The British parliament backed a bill Friday that would legalize assisted suicide.

Following hours of debate, the United Kingdom’s House of Commons voted 330 to 275 in favor of a law that allows citizens with less than six months to live to end their own lives, according to several reports.

The “Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life)” bill must still pass through parliamentary committees and the UK’s House of Lords to become law, according to CNN. Kim Leadbeater, the lawmaker who introduced the bill, expects this to take an additional six months, according to Reuters.

Oxford ethicist Dr. Calum Miller wrote on X the vote was a “huge step towards state-assisted and doctor-assisted murder of old and sick people” in the UK.

“A truly dark day,” he wrote.

Currently, assisted suicide is illegal in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Friday’s vote puts the UK on track to join the handful of other countries that legalize assisted suicide, including Canada, Austrailia and New Zealand. Ten U.S. states, along with Washington, D.C., also permit assisted suicide.

Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) program is now the fifth leading cause of death in the country, with 13,241 people choosing assisted suicide in 2022 alone.

“Almost no MAiD requests are denied by clinicians, and the median time between written request and death from MAiD in 2022 was merely eleven days,” Ethics and Public Policy Center visiting fellow Alexander Raikin wrote in an August report.

In October, a committee reviewing MAiD deaths in Canada found multiple instances of patients seeking assisted suicide for reasons like fears of homelessness or isolation, according to the Associated Press.

During debate Friday, British lawmaker Robert Jenrick said the bill would create “imperceptible changes in behaviors.”

“There will be the grandmother who worries about her grandchildren’s’ inheritance if she does not end her life,” said Jenrick. “There will be the widow who relies on the kindness of strangers, who worries; it preys on her conscience. There will be people who are (and we all know them in our lives) shy, who have low self-esteem, who have demons within them.”

Another parliament member Danny Kruger pointed out that the definition of terminal illness in the bill does not provide safeguards.

“In the case of eating disorders, you just need to refuse food, and the evidence is in jurisdictions around the world… that that would be enough to qualify you for an assisted death,” he said.

Kruger said he has met assisted death specialists in Canada who “personally kill hundreds of patients a year.”

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International

‘Wrong in principle’: Former UK prime ministers torch proposed assisted suicide legislation

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A nurse injects medicine for euthanasia to an elderly man in a hospital bed

From LifeSiteNews

By Jonathon Van Maren

As UK lawmakers prepare to vote on Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide bill, opposition mounts from ex-prime ministers, clergy, and healthcare leaders, who condemn the practice ‘in principle’ while warning of risks to vulnerable patients and flawed safeguards.

At least four former U.K. prime ministers have opposed Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide bill as the Friday vote looms. 

Former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown published his editorial opposing assisted suicide in the Guardian on November 22, revealing that the moments he and his wife spent with their dying infant daughter were among the most precious in his life and calling on Parliament to instead focus on improving end-of-life care. 

According to the Daily Telegraph, former British leaders Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and Baroness Theresa May have all expressed their opposition to the deceitfully named Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill. May’s opposition to assisted suicide has not changed since she voted against it in 2015, and thus she expects to vote against the Leadbeater bill if it progresses to the House of Lords, according to sources close to May.   

Liz Truss has been forthright in her opposition, telling the Telegraph that she is “completely opposed” to assisted suicide: “It is wrong in principle: organs of the state like the NHS and the judicial system should be protecting lives, not ending them.” Boris Johnson also opposes the assisted suicide bill in its current form, the Telegraph reports. Rishi Sunak is not opposed to assisted suicide “in principle,” but has not stated which way he will be voting; Tony Blair has also thus far remained silent.  

Unfortunately, former prime minister David Cameron has changed his view on assisted suicide, stating that despite his previous concerns that vulnerable people might be pressured to end their lives, Leadbeater’s bill has “strong safeguards.” As several experts have already pointed out, Cameron is wrong about the bill – in fact, the legislation as written is vague, disastrous, and filled with loopholes.  

Indeed, the bill’s sponsor and most aggressive champion, Labour MP Kim Leadbeater, has suggested that fear of being a burden is a “legitimate reason” for dying – and the “safeguards,” such as Clause 25, which protects medical professionals involved in assisted suicides from civil liability, reveals who the safeguards are actually for.  

Although the assisted suicide camp still has more confirmed votes, opposition to the bill has been mounting in recent days. The Times condemned the bill, stating in no uncertain terms:  

Legislation sanctioning the killing of human beings, irrespective of life expectancy, is a matter worthy of the most rigorous debate. Ms Leadbeater implied only this week that doctors would be allowed to raise the issue of assisted dying with patients who had expressed no desire for it. Such flippant and ad hoc reasoning behind this most important of bills condemns it.

Even the Church of England has stepped up, with over 1,000 members of the Anglican clergy – including 15 bishops – signing an open letter stating: 

To reduce the value of human life to physical and mental capacity and wellbeing has sinister implications for how we as a society view those who experience severe physical or mental issues.

READ: Euthanasia advocates use deception to affect public’s perception of assisted suicide 

These religious leaders are joined by jurists such as former judge Sir James Munby and former attorney Dominic Grieve. Additionally, 3,400 healthcare professionals, including 23 hospice medical directors and 53 eminent medical professionals, signed a letter stating that Leadbeater’s bill “would threaten society’s ability to safeguard vulnerable patients from abuse.” London Mayor Sadiq Khan also opposes the bill.  

In response, suicide lobby group Dying With Dignity is pouring money into ad campaigns on social media, running 602 Facebook ads in the past month. Supporters of assisted suicide are claiming that a majority of the public supports the bill, and some polls indicate that over 60 percent do. However, as the saying goes, polls are taken to shape public opinion, not gauge it. From the Daily Mail: 

[A new poll] found that when presented with ten basic arguments against assisted suicide – based on experiences from other countries such as Canada where the practice is allowed – support collapses. In this case the proportion of “supporters” who did not switch to oppose or say “don’t know” fell to just 11 per cent, the polling found. Support fell in every social category by between 17 and 49 percentage points.

This poll reveals precisely why Keir Starmer, the U.K.’s first openly atheist prime minister, permitted such an important bill to be so rushed: the more people know, the more they oppose assisted suicide. Let’s hope that the pushback is enough to carry the day.  

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Jonathon Van Maren

Jonathon’s writings have been translated into more than six languages and in addition to LifeSiteNews, has been published in the National PostNational ReviewFirst Things, The Federalist, The American Conservative, The Stream, the Jewish Independent, the Hamilton SpectatorReformed Perspective Magazine, and LifeNews, among others. He is a contributing editor to The European Conservative.

His insights have been featured on CTV, Global News, and the CBC, as well as over twenty radio stations. He regularly speaks on a variety of social issues at universities, high schools, churches, and other functions in Canada, the United States, and Europe.

He is the author of The Culture WarSeeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of AbortionPatriots: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Pro-Life MovementPrairie Lion: The Life and Times of Ted Byfield, and co-author of A Guide to Discussing Assisted Suicide with Blaise Alleyne.

Jonathon serves as the communications director for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.

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