With Canada’s delay with medical help in cases of mental illness, some find comfort, and others fear consequences

When Safana Midose had lunch last October with her mother, Sharon Turkot, Midoz was “all smiles”, as the mother told CBS News.

Turkey remembers thinking about her daughter, who was struggling with a serious mental illness: “Maybe she had turned into an angle.”

The next morning, I received a scheduled email: “My mother, if you read this, I will likely be on my way to heaven,” he said. Her daughter had taken her private life at the age of 44.

“You didn’t want to die in suicide. You didn’t want to die alone,” Torkut said.

Instead, Midoz was seeking a medical help – which Canada suppressed in 2016.

Some welcomed the delay, but others condemned it.

The history of Canada, the maid’s law is still evolving

In 2016, Canada enacted a law that allows medical assistance in death, known as the maid, for people who are reasonably expected his normal death. Under the law, in the wake of an operation that proves that all eligibility criteria have been met, a doctor or nurse runs either a direct substance that stimulates death or prescribes a drug that the person himself consumes.

Five years later, The law has been expandedIt no longer requires a person to be reasonably expected as a criterion of eligibility for adults with a serious and uninterrupted medical condition. In light of the changes, individuals who suffer only from mental illness were excluded temporarily to eligibility until March 2023.

The promoter, whose mother described as a proud transformer, had chosen a date and started preparations for the end of her life.

“He gave me time to accept the fact that my daughter would have died,” Torkut said.

A few days ago, Midoz is likely to be qualified to search for a medical -backed death, however, the government announced a year delay to consider cases of mental illness. Seven months later, Midoz died due to suicide.

The delay in the inclusion of patients looking for a maid based on mental illness has been met with fear from the beginning.

The Experts Committee in Canada concerned with the maid and mental illness, which was created to help develop the government’s approach to expanding the law, clarified fears in 2022 a reportIncluding the arduous task for doctors who have requested predictions about individual patients and prove the lack of benefit and appearance despite the difficulties of predicting the development of mental disorders.

Another factor is what the report is indicated in the name of structural weakness, or the risk of factors such as unstable housing or the lack of job opportunities, which leads to the vision of individuals on death as the only option.

The committee made a number of recommendations in its report to establish an expanded maid system.

However, the future of the maid’s expansion also depends somewhat on local policy, which appears to be prepared. Pierre Poelifer, who is the Conservative Party Even a large margin in the polls Before the national elections, it is scheduled to take place within a year, it has He pledged to “cancel” fully expand “ From the law to include mental health issues only, on the pretext that it is unclear “between preventing suicide and suicide assistance.”

“I would have died the way you wanted.”

Since the death of her daughter, in the meantime, Turcott has become an advocate to reach the maid for those whose only underlying condition is mental illness.

“She will die the way she wanted, and because this is what she wanted, that was good with me,” said Turkot. “Suicide was not fine with me.”

In February, the government postponed the maid’s eligibility for patients whose only condition is mental illness until March 2027 – after four years of his position in the beginning.

“Although the great progress was made in supporting practitioners in assessing the maid’s eligibility in complex cases, the country’s health system” has not yet been ready for the maid where the only inherent condition is a mental illness. “

The delay condemned some defenders of the maid. Death with Dignity Canada, an organization calling for the end of life, has presented a August claim claim Discriminatory exclusion in law against persons with mental illness.

A continuous discussion about reaching the maid

However, others look at delay as a step to ensure necessary guarantees in place and health care providers are prepared to deal with related conditions. Canada Mental Health Association He said in the January statement It is supported by delay, pointing to what is called time and insufficient resources for ensuring that people with mental illness can reach the necessary care.

Some groups oppose the expansion of the law directly. In September, Lickussion Canada, a non -profit group calling for Canadians with mental disabilities, filed a lawsuit challenging the maid for persons with disabilities who do not die or his death is “reasonably expected”.

The lawsuit argues that Maid Track 2, the expansion of the law for 2021 to include patients whose death cannot be expected to death, has already led to early deaths.

“People die. We are witnessing an anxious trend where people with disabilities are looking for suicide with the help of social deprivation, poverty and lack of basic support.” He said In September.

Regarding the fears of CMHA and integration in Canada, a committee of experts from professionals has identified specializations including morals, social work and medicine that reviewed the death of the maid in Ontario cases in which she said isolation and unparalleled social needs, such as housing, which fueled many of the recipients of the merciful murder.

The committee also found that patients who were seeking eligibility under the standards of the 2nd 2ndar 2 were more vulnerable in the fields of the province with high levels of social marginalization than the TRACK 1 beneficiaries.

the Committee report He admitted that although the deaths discussed were not necessarily the repeated causes of Maid Track 2, or even the majority of the death of Maid Track 2, the topics identified “were not common in the maid review process.”

Of the 4,644 medical -backed deaths that were carried out during the year 2023 under Canada maid lawOnly 116 deaths were sick 2, according to the committee.

But the results of the report do not hesitate to resonate with everyone, and the opposition to the inclusion of the proposed law for patients who suffer from mental illness only was very frustrated for some people looking for the maid.

Jason, a Toronto resident who does not want to be fully identified because of the fears that the future of the maid’s review can be affected, is one of these people.

“When I first heard that he was late, my world breakdown,” he said.

Jason told CBS News that he had struggled with depression, anxiety and panic for decades, and he tried to commit suicide twice. He said he had tried internal patient programs, medications, electrical therapy, and the treatment of ketamine, among other treatments, for little.

He said, “I will not be alive today if there is no possibility that a maid will pass in 2027,” saying that the opportunity to expand the maid is the only reason that he did not try to commit suicide for the third time.

Current protection for those looking for the maid Her death includes an unexpected way independently practitioners – one of which must have experience in the condition that affects the patient – which confirms that all eligibility standards are met, at least from 90 days to evaluate eligibility, and an opportunity for the patient to withdraw approval at any point until the procedure is carried out.

The patient must also be informed of consulting and careful care options, support for disability and mental health, and to be submitted to consult with the concerned professionals in addition to discussing them with their practitioner “a reasonable and available means to alleviate the suffering of the person, and consent (with the practitioner) that the person has been seriously considered in these means.”

in reconnaissance It was conducted in 2023 through death with Dignity Canada, 78 % of the respondents said they supported the removal of the “expected” expected natural death requirements from the maid’s law, indicating strong support for the expansion of track 2. But a Survey 2017 The measurement of Canadian psychiatrists ’positions towards medical assistance in death only found a minority of 29.4 % of the maid supported on the basis of mental illness alone, compared to 71.8 % who said that other factors should also be present to determine eligibility.

Jason said he was opposing some doctors to the maid for mental illness.

“The doctors there to make you better,” he said. But he added that since mental illness is not something “appears on the screen”, it may be difficult for people without experience directly to understand the pain of another person.

“I do not have the physical pain that someone else suffers from, but psychological pain is equally bad,” he said.

In 2022, the maid’s deaths accounted for 4.1 % of the total deaths in Canada, where the average age of the maid patients is 77 years, according to Canada. The fourth and latest annual report On medical help. Since the law was brought in 2016, there has been a total of 44,958 deaths with medical help in the country.

Jason said he did not want to put his family by shocking another suicide attempt, and that his brother and mother were helping him to explore options abroad. These options, especially for people with mental illness, are limited, and are often complicated due to the different local laws around the world.

Jason said he, like Turkot, his mother supports his choice to search for a maid.

“As much as you don’t want me to do it again, she prefers to die properly with the help of a doctor instead of suicide,” he said.

Turkey said she is concerned that postponing the maid on the basis of mental health will lead to more suicide, which leaves families an unexpected mourning.

She said: “I do not want anyone to test the loss of his child by suicide, and their child is so desperate that they did not see another option but to take his life.”