The Canadian Experience with Medical Assistance in Dying in Canada

Hear from medical expert Dr. Stefanie Green, about the Canadian Experience with Medical Assistance in Dying in Canada (MAiD). MAiD became legal in Canada about the same time that California’s law became legal – in 2016. Canada has roughly the same population as California. The rate of people taking advantage of California’s End of Life Option Act is less than 1%, while the rate in at least one Canadian province is 7%.
Canada’s laws are clearly less restrictive than California’s.

Canada’s medical assistance in dying laws are the result of a unanimous Canadian Supreme Court decision in 2015 ( Carter v. Canada ) declaring laws prohibiting medical assistance in dying were unconstitutional.

I attended yesterday. Stefanie was wonderful. It was a great talk. I really got a lot out of it.
-anonymous 11/17/19

This meeting was recorded in Nov., 2019. Canada is still in the process of refining their laws (each province administers the law, so the rules are somewhat different in different provinces.) The expectation is that some of the information in this video will become outdated within the next 6 months.

Dr. Stefanie Green spends the majority of her time working in assisted dying. She is medical advisor to the BC Ministry of Health Medical Assistance in Dying oversight committee. She is co-founder and current President of the Canadian Association of Medical Aid in Dying Assessors and Providers (CAMAP).

Thank you to Steve Pettit of Spike4 Creative for filming and editing this video.