Audrey Parker’s extraordinary story highlights a crucial difficulty in Canada’s right-to-die legislation, the law that gives people with terminal illnesses the right to medical assistance in ending their life.
The Halifax woman, profiled by The Chronicle Herald’s John DeMont, has been fighting a losing battle against cancer for almost three years now. Oncologists usually estimate how much time a terminal cancer patient might have left; Parker knows exactly how much time, to the day.
That’s because she has picked her date. Attending on that day, Nov. 1, will be a group of her own choosing. She knows the person who will administer the series of three injections that will end her life. She is remarkably upbeat. Many of us would, to borrow a line from Dylan Thomas, “rage, rage against the dying of the light.” But Parker has had more time to think about it than most of us will get, and, instead of raging, accepts the inevitable.
This is where it gets more difficult than it should be. Even as Audrey Parker has had to accept that she’s dying, the law’s requirements make it illegal for her to direct a medical professional to carry out her request unless she is awake, aware and of sound mind at the time.
The law is clear: any medical professional must “immediately before providing the medical assistance in dying, give the person an opportunity to withdraw their request and ensure that the person gives express consent to receive medical assistance in dying.”
This is to provide the dying person one last chance to change her mind. No one wants to conduct this procedure if there’s any doubt on this question.
But consider an experience common to terminal cancer patients. Many endure constant pain but can cope with the help of medication. The progress of the disease may well rob the sufferer of the capacity for consent before they realize what’s happened. Parker’s cancer, for instance, has spread to the lining of her brain.
Parker said she’s worried that if she lost her mental capacity, she would be unable to ensure that her last wish would be carried out. So she moved the date up.
This seems unnecessarily cruel. Parker, like many people in her situation, may well have had several good weeks or months beyond the date she picked. That’s a big sacrifice.
Wouldn’t most of us want as much time as possible?
Changes to the Criminal Code allowing for medical assistance in dying were only enacted in 2016 after years of emotional and difficult debate. They represent, as we said in an editorial at the time, “a solid, very cautious, very Canadian first step.”
It lays out strict, limited conditions under which a doctor can help gravely ill people end their lives. It decided against a broader approach that would extend the right to die to those suffering greatly but not in imminent danger of dying. We’ve now put that law to the test for two years, and no doubt many dilemmas similar to Audrey Parker’s have been encountered by doctors, lawyers and patients trying to follow its direction.
Maybe it’s time to take a small, second step. At the very least, the law should allow for earlier consent. People facing the end of their lives should not have to give up any more time than necessary.