Euthanasia lobby pressures BC government to force Catholic hospitals to provide euthanasia (MAiD)

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

*Sign the EPC petition: Catholic hospitals must not be forced to provide (MAiD) euthanasia (Petition Link).

St Paul's hospital Vancouver.

The euthanasia lobby group, Dying With Dignity, is lobbying the British Columbia (BC) government to force Catholic hospitals to provide euthanasia.

The euthanasia lobby is using the story of Samantha O'Neill (34), who died on April 4 by euthanasia (MAiD) after being transferred from St Paul's hospital in Vancouver to St. John’s Hospice (run by Vancouver Coastal Health).

Katie DeRosa reported for The Vancouver Sun on June 23 that Dying With Dignity and O'Neill's family initiated a campaign to pressure the BC government to force Catholic hospitals to kill their patients by euthanasia. DeRosa reported:

O’Neill’s family and Dying with Dignity Canada say it’s unacceptable that a taxpayer-funded hospital like St. Paul’s — which is getting a $2 billion replacement in 2027 — forces dying patients to leave its facility to get MAID.

Dying with Dignity’s CEO Helen Long told DeRosa:

such policies will remain in place unless there’s a successful court challenge.

Shannon Paterson published a report on CTV news on June 27 stating:

Daphne Gilbert, a constitutional law professor at the University of Ottawa, expects a Charter challenge will be filed.

“The Catholic Church does not fund health care, they don’t put money into the health-care system through these institutions. It’s not like this is a shared funding agreement. All of the money is coming from the taxpayers,” said Gilbert.

*Sign the EPC petition: Catholic hospitals must not be forced to provide (MAiD) euthanasia (Petition Link).

Alex Muir, the Chair of the euthanasia lobby Metro Vancouver chapter of Dying With Dignity wrote in a letter to the editor in the Vancouver Sun that:

Katie DeRosa’s story about Samantha O’Neill’s horrific forced transfer from St. Paul’s Hospital to access medical assistance in dying (MAID) highlights the need to stop these transfers.

... The province has the power and the financial leverage to change this, but lacks the political will due to Providence’s prominence in our publicly funded health care system. Shame all around.

This is not the first time that Dying With Dignity (a registered charity) has lobbied the BC government to force Catholic hospitals to kill their patients by euthanasia.

I published an article on March 8, 2022 entitled: Canada's euthanasia lobby demands that religious medical facilities kill. The euthanasia lobby wants to stop the transfer of people who have requested euthanasia by forcing denominational medical institutions to do euthanasia.

The Canadian Press reported:

Dying With Dignity says the service is being restricted because of an agreement that allows facilities covered by the Denominational Health Association to collect taxpayer dollars but refuse to perform services they oppose on religious or moral grounds.

Alex Muir, chair of the Metro Vancouver chapter of Dying With Dignity, says upholding the agreement denies eligible people their constitutionally protected right to access a medically assisted death.The British Columbia government is already forcing provincially funded medical institutions that are not affiliated with a denomination to provide (MAiD) euthanasia.

In February 2021 the Delta Hospice Society was defunded by the BC Ministry of Health because they refused to kill their patients.

The first attempt to force a religious medical institution to participate in euthanasia was in 2019 when the euthanasia lobby pressured the Nova Scotia government to order St Martha's Hospital in Antigonish NS to provide euthanasia. The Nova Scotia government succumbed to the pressure and ordered St Martha's Hospital to provide euthanasia. Consequently, the Antigonish Health and Wellness Centre, which is not owned by St Martha's hospital, agreed to provide euthanasia.