A group of doctors at a children’s hospital in Canada have written a policy on how they would implement the euthanasia of children, and seem to conclude that it could happen without parental consent.
Since Canada legalised “medical aid in dying (MAID)” as it is known in 2016, the issue of euthanasia for “mature minors” has been debated. The government has asked the Council of Canadian Academies to produce a report on this issue, as well as euthanasia for mental health issues and advance directives, by December this year.
However, a working group at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto have published an essay detailing the forming of their policy on assisted suicide in a paediatric setting – at present, just for those patients who are 18 or over, but arguing that it could apply to younger children.
The doctors consider MAID as “practically and ethically equivalent to other medical practices that result in the end of life”; in other words, that deliberately killing someone by euthanasia is morally the same as palliative care practices such as use of pain-relieving drugs or withdrawal of inappropriate interventions that sometimes result in the end of life, but are not carried out with that intention.
Furthermore, they explain that in Ontario, “young people can be and are found capable of making their own medical decisions, even when those decisions may result in their death”. If MAID is a normal medical procedure, then, they reason, children should also be considered capable to decide on euthanasia.
