From a talk presented on Nov. 28, 2016 at Osgoode OPD

1. Physician-Assisted Dying: The
Regulatory Challenges
November 28, 2016
Omar Ha-Redeye
AAS, BHA (Hons.), PGCert, JD, LLM
CNMT, RT(N)(ARRT)
12th Annual National Forum:
Administrative Law and Practice

2. Potential Challenges to Existing Regime
• Minors
− Convention on the Rights of the Child,
 Right of all children to express views freely in all matters with
weight to age and maturity
− AC v. Manitoba (Director of Child and Family Services)
 “it would be arbitrary to assume that no one under the age of 16
has capacity to make medical treatment decisions”
• Mental Health versus Physical Health
− Alberta Court of Appeal in Canada (Attorney General) v. E.F.
 Interpret Carter to including persons with a psychiatric condition

3. • Advance Directives and Substitute Decision
Makers
− May be needed with conditions likely to cause
loss of capacity
 Ensure that MAID not provided if still
capable
− Exemption form liability needed for all those
assisting in the discussion

4. Julia Lamb’s Constitutional Challenge
• Julia Lamb filed constitutional challenge in B.C. Supreme
Court on 10 days after Parliament passed the law
− spinal muscular atrophy means she could live for years,
decades
− different category from end-stage patients with cancer,
amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, with reasonable foreseeability
• Carter was about the suffering, not necessarily about the
death
− Government concern about abuse and protection of
vulnerable
− Justified under s.1?
• Discussion of pleadings

5. Ongoing LCO Papers on End of Life
• Dr. Arne Stinchcombe, Dr. Katherine Kortes-Miller & Dr.
Kimberley Wilson: Perspectives on the final stages of
life from LGBT elders living in Ontario
• Dr. Mary Chiu, Dr. Adrian Grek, Sonia Meerai, LJ Nelles,
Dr. Joel Sadavoy & Dr. Virginia Wesson: Understanding
the lived experience of individuals, caregivers and
families touched by frailty, chronic illness and
dementia in Ontario
• Dr. Donna Wilson & Dr. Stephen Birch: Improved care
setting transitions in the last year of life
• And more…