The president of a BC hospice society says their Do Not Euthanize Defense Kit is a necessary tool to head off a healthcare system too eager to dish out death.The Delta Hospice Society (DHS) issued the kit late last year. The kit includes a wallet-sized DNE card that includes the name of the cardholder and reads, “I require healthcare not ‘MAID.’ For more information contact: #1-800-232-1589.” The reverse side says, “I, (name here), have signed a Do Not Euthanize Advance Directive (DNE).”DHS president Angelina Ireland, says the kit is a tool to protect patients who don't want to receive a medically assisted death or even have the option discussed with them. In an interview with Western Standard, Ireland complained the euthanasia agenda is pervasive."There's going to be no place for anybody to hide from this euthanasia. Just a Canadian cull is all it is to kill the sick and the old and the desperate and the vulnerable. And nobody's doing anything to stop it. All they're doing is creating more avenues to kill people," Ireland said.DHS lost its hospice built with private funds in Ladner, B.C. because it would not provide euthanasia onsite. A lawsuit in B.C. is challenging provincial law that allows faith-based hospitals and hospices to refuse the provision of medically-assisted deaths onsite.Each DNE card includes a unique national registry number that’s registered on a secure database administered by the DHS. An associated long-form DNE directive states, “I do not consent to any active intervention, by medicine or other means, that is administered or undertaken with the overt or covert intention of ending my life. This may include opiates, or other drugs, used to deliberately bring about my death.”A declaration in the DNE kit, separate from the advance directive, says, “If any healthcare employee, or any other person, speaks to me about ‘MAiD,’ I will consider it harassment and will not hesitate to take steps personally, or by way of my legal representative, to have such an individual ... prosecuted for counselling to commit suicide.”Canada’s Fifth Annual Report on MAID, published Dec. 11, 2024, and covering the year 2023, 15,343 people received the procedure in 2023, accounting for 4.7% of all Canadians who died that year. This was a 15.8% increase from 2022. In addition, 75% of MAID recipients received palliative care, and cancer was the most common underlying medical condition, cited in 64.1% of cases. The terminally ill can be killed the same day they request it.Ireland says she first encountered DHS during her own battle of cancer. Following two surgeries, chemo, and radiation, she recovered. Last year, she visited cancer patient Pat Grey in Chilliwack, B.C., who complained her doctor told her MAiD was a tool God could use to end her suffering."I've seen many people who diagnosed at many different stages, who have recovered, who sure as heck don't need predatory doctors coming after them, telling them, 'Just take MAiD, you ever thought of just killing yourself?' or 'Let me just kill you.' No. Since when is that acceptable?"Ireland said death is cheaper than healthcare in Canada's taxpayer-funded system, causing an "absolute nightmare.""They don't have to spend any money on chemo, they don't have to spend money on radiation, any kind of treatment, just kill them," Ireland said. "It's what it's what has become of an overburdened, bankrupt system where now they're going to fix the problem on the backs of the the old and the infirm."A 2022 paper by the Canadian Association of MAiD Assessors and Providers states that “physicians and nurse practitioners … have a professional obligation to initiate a discussion about MAiD" but not "with the aim of inducing, persuading, or convincing the patient to request MAiD.”A survey released by Angus Reid last month found 41% of Canadians worry patients may feel pressured to choose MAID if it is offered by a doctor, but an identical number disagreed that this is a potential issue.
