Doctors in Canada have said euthanasia for newborn babies who’re born with disabilities “could also be an appropriate treatment”, as concerns grow in regards to the expansion of Canada’s euthanasia and assisted suicide programme.
Speaking on behalf of the Quebec College of Physicians (CMQ) to the Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying, Dr Louis Roy previously really helpful that euthanasia be introduced for babies with “severe deformations” and “very grave… medical syndromes”. Last month, the CMQ reiterated their position.
The CMQ added that, under these circumstances, the deliberate ending of a baby’s life constitutes “care”.
The proposal has prompted severe criticism, with Wesley J. Smith, a senior fellow on the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism, saying, “Canada has jumped so enthusiastically into the euthanasia abyss that I even have little doubt that infanticide will eventually be allowed there. It’s only logical. If killing is a suitable answer to suffering, why limit the killing to adults?”
The proposal comes as Canada’s euthanasia and assisted suicide programme continues to expand. In 2021, the Canadian Parliament repealed the requirement that the natural death of those applying for assisted suicide be “reasonably foreseeable”. This took place only five years after the original laws allowing euthanasia and assisted suicide was passed in 2016.
In 2024, laws was introduced in order that euthanasia and assisted suicide can be legal on the grounds of mental health alone in March 2027, whilst a Parliamentary committee in Canada really helpful in 2023 that euthanasia be made available for youngsters under certain conditions, and that it’s made more easily available for prisoners.
If the CMQ recommendations on euthanasia for disabled babies are accepted, Canada would join the Netherlands, where euthanasia is permitted for babies before the age of 1 in the event that they are considered suffering unbearably and with the consent of their parents. The Atlantic noted that the Netherlands was the primary country to adopt the practice of euthanasia for babies “since Nazi Germany did so in 1939”.
Speaking before Second Reading of Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide Bill, Trudo Lemmens, professor of law on the University of Toronto, who initially supported Canada’s assisted suicide and euthanasia law, said “One of essentially the most worrying facets of the Canadian experiment is it shows that when you begin legalising, there’s a risk that a major variety of physicians normalise this practice”.
“It’s like putting fuel on the hearth. I’m unsure it could be easily contained”.
In Canada in 2023, essentially the most recent yr for which data is on the market, 15,343 people died through euthanasia and assisted suicide. This equates to 4.7% of all deaths.
Spokesperson for Right To Life UK, Catherine Robinson, said “Advocating for euthanasia for disabled children is appalling and a transparent type of eugenic discrimination. Babies with severe disabilities deserve care, and their families need support. Canada shouldn’t be considering euthanising its most vulnerable residents.”
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