In Canada, Euthanasia as “Boon” to Organ Donation
assisted suicide, Belgium, bioethics, bodies, Canada, disabled, donations, euthanasia, MAiD, medically assisted deaths, Medicine, mentally ill, Netherlands, Ontario, organ donation, Ottawa Citizen, patients, Ronnie Gavsie, Trillium Gift of Life Network
My very first anti-euthanasia column, published in Newsweek, warned that societal acceptance of assisted suicide/euthanasia would eventually include organ harvesting “as a plum to society.” I was called an alarmist and a fear-monger, but alas, I was right. In Belgium and the Netherlands, mentally ill and disabled people are killed in hospitals at their request, and then, their bodies are harvested — with the success of the procedures written up with all due respect in organ-transplant medical journals. Our Cousins to the North Our closest cultural cousins in Canada are enthusiastically following the same utilitarian path, not only allowing organ harvesting to be conjoined with euthanasia, but “medically assisted death” is being boosted increasingly as “a boon.” Note the celebratory lede in this Ottawa Citizen story: Ontarians who opt for…