Medical Assistance in Dying committee  Well, I'm not sure that it's a slippery slope, but I want to make sure that we're mindful when we're thinking about it. Just as we tend to say that we want to make sure everybody has had an opportunity for all of the medical treatment that they require, I was flagging that it would be good to also make sure that people have a proper social assessment and they get access to all of the social supports that are required.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  Well, there's the COVID situation, but in places like the U.K. they've had the biggest drop in the standard of living since 1950 because of the economic climate and the possibility of a bigger or wider war. I think it's not just COVID. We have climate change and we have significant economic problems that are headwinds that we seem to have to be thinking about.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  Yes. I think we should do as much as we can to try to alleviate people's suffering. I'm probably different from the other panellists because I'm a psychiatrist who has seen a lot of suffering over the last 30 years, and I don't want people to suffer needlessly, so I would balance people's rights to make their own decisions with what can be reasonably offered by the state.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  No, that wouldn't be—

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  My position would be that most of the information to date that we have on MAID at the moment is...well, it's obviously historical, but we haven't hit a steady state on the numbers of people who are eventually going to be getting MAID in Canada. We also have changes in the law coming through, as well as changes in guidelines and safeguards, so we don't know exactly where we're going to end up.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  Yes. I think the Health Canada recommendation of a multidisciplinary team taking assessments over time and getting collateral information is probably the best we can do with our science at the moment. Taking a considered case-by-case approach to this situation is done in various other parts of the world, and I think that's the best we can do at the moment.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  I'm a psychiatrist, and obviously MAID will essentially be unavailable to people with mental health problems until 2023, so I haven't been able to observe that myself.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  Thank you very much. I hope you can hear me loud and clear. I apologize. This has been my most embarrassing Zoom call so far this year. I apologize for that, but we've managed to get on. Thanks very much for allowing me to speak today. I'm honoured to be here. As you know, I was the chair of the 2018 report by the CCA on MAID and mental disorders as a single underlying medical condition.