We Want Canadian MAiD Incorporated into the Qld VAD Act. Now!!!

We are envious of the Canadian’s MAiD legislation, and would like to see the best bits of this legislation incorporated into our own Qld VAD Act.

We need to get rid of the “expected to cause death within 12 months” clause from our legisation, and include both Track 1 and Track 2 type accessibility options from Canada’s MAiD into our Act. Now already!

So let’s take you through it….

The law governing Medical Assistance In Dying (MAiD) in Canada is available from the Parliament of Canada website here. Of note are sections 241.2(1) “Eligibility for MAID”; and 241.2(2) “Grievous and Irremediable Medical Condition”.

The “End-of-Life Law and Policy in Canada” provides a great explanation of the Canadian MAiD legislation. Click here for their website. For the specific details of Canadian MAiD, explained in a really clear way, click here.

To access MAiD in Canada you must:

• be eligible for health care services in Canada
• be at least 18 years old
• be capable of making decisions with respect to your health
• have asked for MAiD yourself and no one is pressuring you to ask for it
• have been told about other available ways to relieve your suffering, including palliative care
• have given informed consent to receive MAiD
• have what is called a “grievous and irremediable medical condition”

Having a “grievous and irremediable medical condition” means:

• you have a serious and incurable illness, disease or disability
• you are in an advanced state of irreversible decline in capability
• your illness, disease or disability or that state of decline causes you enduring physical or psychological suffering that is intolerable to you and that cannot be relieved under conditions that you consider acceptable

And then, there are now two tracks along which you proceed to access Canadian MAiD:

1. If a person’s natural death has become reasonably foreseeable, then they proceed along “Track One” with the requisite procedural safeguards.
2. If a person’s natural death has not become reasonably foreseeable, then they proceed along “Track Two” with modified / additional procedural safeguards.

Both tracks require that you have a “grievous and irremediable medical condition”.

However, and unlike our Qld VAD Act, it appears the Canadians do not have an “expected to cause death within 12 months” clause that is stipulated in our legislation. All that is required for Track 1 is that a person’s death has become “reasonably foreseeable”.

However if your death is not reasonably foreseeable, you can still access MAiD. Via Track 2.

Track 1 is the path for those whose natural death is reasonably forseeable. But for Track 2 this is not a requirement. However for Track 2 there are additonal requirements including a minimum period of 90 days between day of first assessment and the day on which MAiD is provided to them. Track 1 has no minimum waiting period between the day the request was signed and the day MAiD is provided.

Way to go Canada!! 🤗

We need to get rid of the “expected to cause death within 12 months” clause from our legisation, and include both Track 1 and Track 2 type accessibility options into a new hybrid version for our Qld VAD Act. This is where we need to head people!!! 👍 👍

Canadian MAiD Annual Reports

The most recently available annual report (2023) from the Canadian health authorities for Medical Assistance in Dying in Canada is available from the Government of Canada website here. The 2023 report for Medical Assistance in Dying in Canada became available this week on 11 December 2024. It makes for interesting reading.

From the 2023 Report:

• The report recorded 19,660 MAiD requests that Health Canada received in 2023.
• Of these, 15,343 people received MAiD, the remaining cases were requests that did not result in MAiD;
• 2,906 died before receiving MAiD; 915 individuals were deemed ineligible; and 496 withdrew their request.
• The number of MAiD provisions in 2023 represents an increase of 15.8% over 2022. This represents a slowing over previous years (2019 to 2022) which had an average growth rate of approximately 31%.
• Consistent with findings from previous years, those who received MAiD under Track 1 were older, and more likely to have cancer as an underlying medical condition:
  • The median age was 77.7 years and 59.7% were over 75 years of age
  • 51.6% were men and 48.4% were women
  • Cancer was the most frequently reported underlying medical condition, cited in 64.1% of cases
• Those receiving MAID under Track 2 predominantly women, slightly younger, and lived with their illness for a much longer period of time:
  • The median age was 75.0 years and 50.2% were over 75 years of age.
  • 58.5% were women and 41.5% were men. This is consistent with overall population health trends where women experience long-term chronic illness, which can cause enduring suffering but would not typically make a person’s death reasonably foreseeable.
  • Lived longer with a serious and incurable condition than those in Track 1: 31.8% of people receiving MAID under Track 2 lived with a serious and incurable illness, disease or disability for more than 10 years, compared to 7.7% of those under Track 1.
  • Neurological conditions and “other” conditions (such as diabetes, frailty, autoimmune conditions, chronic pain) were the most commonly cited underlying medical conditions.
• Although Track 2 provisions represent 4.1% of MAID cases, they represent 26.9% of ineligible requests.

The prior year’s report for 2022 is available here. Date published: October 2023.

Did You Know?

There were 326,571 total deaths in Canada in 2023. See this website for this data.

Therefore, from our own back of the envelope calculation, the 15,343 people that received MAID in 2023 represents 4.7% of all deaths in Canada for that year. This statistic seems fairly typical of many jurisdictions with MAiD / VAD from around the world.