Boston, Mass., Feb 15, 2023 / 16:45 pm
The Canadian government has introduced legislation to delay by one year plans to include mental illness among the list of conditions eligible for the country’s assisted suicide program.
The assisted suicide law — which is euphemistically coined Medical Assistance in Dying — excludes Canadians from eligibility whose only medical condition is mental illness.
In 2021 lawmakers excluded mental illness for a two-year period to allow “additional time to study how MAID on the basis of a mental illness can safely be provided and to ensure appropriate safeguards are in place to protect those persons,” according to the Canadian Justice Department’s website.
With the end of that two-year ban quickly approaching, Minister of Justice David Lametti has introduced legislation to keep the exclusion in place for another year, until March 17, 2024.