Issues@Hand

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May 2017 – After nearly a year of legalized physician-assisted suicide in Canada, doctors in systemic numbers are removing themselves from the list of those willing to execute euthanasia.

In Ontario alone, one of the few regions that track the data, 24 doctors have been removed from the voluntary referral list.

“…We’re seeing doctors who go through one experience, and it’s just overwhelming; it’s too difficult,” Dr. Jeff Blackmer, vice president of medical professionalism at the Canadian Medical Association, said. “[T]he psychological impact of that final, very definitive act [is no] less than it would be for anybody.”

The decline of willing physicians has also been attributed to legal ambiguities and a fear of being prosecuted. Of 262 reported euthanasia deaths in the first nine months of the law, 21 were found to be non-compliant with regulations and were, therefore, considered illegal killings.

nationalpost.com, 2/26/17