Madam Speaker, in an article yesterday, Joan Bryden of the Canadian Press reported that the Minister of Disability Inclusion believes that health practitioners should not be allowed to discuss the issue of medical assistance in dying until a patient asks about it, and that she is open to amending the legislation to make that clear. Some health care practitioners, however, disagree with that position, arguing that they have a duty to talk about all options available to patients. Have they ever thought about it? What are their thoughts on life and death? These are very simple questions.
The Canadian Nurses Association has urged the government to specifically clarify in the law that health practitioners can initiate discussions on medical assistance in dying with their patients. I would add that Jocelyn Downie, a professor of law and medicine at Dalhousie University in Halifax, said that informing patients about all options available to them is a fundamental principle of Canadian consent law. In her view, an amendment that prohibits raising the issue would be a cruel amendment and would fly in the face of well-established statutory and professional legal standards. She went on to say that it would also likely chill discussions of medical assistance in dying, as clinicians may fear liability.
I would like to know what the government really thinks about this matter.