Thank you very much, Chair.
I want to thank the witnesses for coming once again and exploring with us some of the questions we need to ask about this very important topic.
I think what I heard from Mr. Ross is that palliative care is an actual continuum or spectrum of care as a person seeks MAID, and palliative care is an integral and important part of that. What I'd like to find out is this. As you well know, inherent in the Carter decision is the idea that this is about the patient's fully informed choice, as you mentioned. However, it is a normal part of practising medicine that you must fully inform your patients of all their options in treatment and care before they start making choices.
As Carter said, if this is about the patient's decision eventually, for whatever reasons, once they're fully informed, what do you think would happen if the patient decided that given all that information, they did not want to go into palliative care? That's the first question I want to ask you.
The second question I want to ask is about whether or not palliative care, which is in provincial jurisdiction, is readily available for a particular patient. We've heard the stories that sometimes they're not ready or they're not available, or the patient doesn't have an ability to live life because they don't have support systems. If all that is there and is available to them, do you believe they must have palliative care, or do you believe there is still an option based on informed consent?