Thank you, Dr. Blackmer.
Before Senator Joyal asks his questions, I'm going to take the chair's prerogative and ask a question.
In the nurses' presentation, you were recommending that we have policies and procedures to ensure competency assessment throughout the journey. Dr. Branigan was talking about a worry that we could be prematurely hastening death as a result of some of the processes around physician-assisted dying.
Is there a concern that ensuring competency until the moment that assistance is given could hasten death because someone might want to make sure that they make that decision while they are deemed competent, yet could still be competent and could enjoy a quality of life for a number of months afterward? Might they be so afraid that they will not have their advance directive honoured that we would actually be encouraging them to die earlier?
I'm concerned about a difference that I'm hearing in the panel. Do you have thoughts on that?