by NexDev | June 21, 2017 | News
One year after « Medical Assistance in Dying “(MAID) was legalized in Canada, a number of emblematic cases have occurred and have led to the first requests for extending the scope of the law.
On June 17, 2016, a federal bill known as C-14 was passed in Canada, which decriminalized euthanasia and assisted suicide.
This federal law was passed just shortly after the province of Quebec had voted in favor of “Law 52”. This bill which was adopted in June 2014 became effective in December 2015. Since then, 400 cases of euthanasia have already been documented in Quebec.
Critiques rapidly voiced their opposition reproaching both the law in Quebec and the federal law as being too restrictive, and as being contrary to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Canadian Government declared these restrictions to be justified on behalf of the fight against suicide.
Federal law allows euthanasia and assisted suicide for patients only when “natural death is reasonably foreseeable” meaning imminent or in the very near future. The law in Quebec is for patients at the end of their life, which should cover a broader time frame.
Two individuals from Quebec filed suit against the unconstitutionality of both the federal law and the Quebec law. Recently, the Quebec Health and Social Services Minister also personally announced that this issue would be considered and evaluated.
Euthanasia was refused in two recent cases in Montreal for patients with irremediable, serious and degenerative pathologies because they were not at the end-of-life. The criteria of “imminent death” must be met both for the federal law and the Quebec law before the right for medical assistance in dying is allowed. The two patients thus decided to file a court suit. According to their lawyer, the current laws are unconstitutional, since they do not respect the criteria established by the Supreme Court in the Carter ruling from February 2015. The only criteria is “that the individual must be a mentally competent and consenting adult, with a serious and irremediable pathology, and experiencing suffering which healthcare cannot alleviate.” Thus according to the plaintiffs, euthanasia requests should not be prohibited on the basis of the end-of-life criteria.
In addition to the end-of-life criteria, other discussions are being held to extend the scope of the law, for instance practicing euthanasia on mentally ill individuals. Currently the law in Quebec prohibits any kind of euthanasia practice for individuals unable to consent on their own behalf. Nevertheless, last March, the husband of a woman suffering dementia (Alzheimer’s disease) put her to death “by compassion”. This event incited discussions of allowing euthanasia for the mentally ill.
Although MAID is only authorized for patients who are suffering, the Secretary of the College of Physicians in Quebec, Yves Robert warns against triggering a form of “death à la carte” mentality which could evolve into a form of assisted suicide managed by private companies, as in Switzerland. “Within a year of legalizing euthanasia, what is surprising is how quickly public opinion has changed from originally considering the law as a “major advance”, but now appears to judge the same law as being too restrictive. Let’s take time to think about the situation, before going even further. There’s no emergency rush to die.”
Finances may also play a major role in practicing MAID in Canada. Already, like in the USA, surveys have been conducted: potential cost-savings have been calculated ‘thanks’ to requests for assistance in dying. The Canadian Medical Association Journal published an analysis based on the data from Holland and Belgium where assisted dying has been legal for quite some time, combined with data from Ontario for medical healthcare costs for patients at the end-of-life. The authors concluded “If Canadians implemented medical assistance in dying in a similar manner and magnitude as Belgium and Holland, we could reduce healthcare costs by dozens of millions of dollars per year.”
In these latter two European countries, cases of violating the law keep increasing. Alliance VITA recently published the results in Belgium after 15 years of legalized euthanasia.
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For further information :
Testimony of an American woman who declines aid in dying (Center for Bioethics and Culture)
by NexDev | June 16, 2017 | Uncategorized
On June 3, 2017 Columbia legalized a union between 3 men for the first time ever. The men forming this “trouple” include an actor, a physical education instructor and a journalist. They are registered under the legal patrimonial system known as “trieja”. Two of the men were the first to be married in 2000 by a notary, well before marriage between individuals of the same sex was legalized in 2016.
« We wanted to formalize our household, our family. There were no legal acknowledgements for us as a family” declared Victor Hugo Prada, one of the members. This “trouple” qualify themselves as a “polyamourous” family. Germain Rincon Perfetti, the lawyer for the “LGBTI” association (lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexual and intersexual) declares: “This is an acknowledgement that different types of families exist”.
Other three-way partnerships have been recognized in different countries such as the 3 Brazilian women in 2015 or the 3 American women in 2014, with one of the women expecting a child conceived by IVF.
Tugdual Derville, Alliance VITA’s General Delegate:
« This is a symbolic first step, not in itself, but by the complacent media coverage. It’s part of a relentless legal offensive against marriage founded on sexual complementarity and fidelity. As the lawyer Caroline Mécary admitted in November 2013: « To succeed in abolishing marriage, we first have to make sure that it is available to everyone”. In January of the same year she declared: “It was pertinent and coherent to take advantage of advocating civil marriage for same-sex couples to achieve marriage secularization, by removing the promise of fidelity…” To destroy marriages, its definition is being warped through several steps, according to the one step at a time policy.
The same individuals intending to deconstruct society previously berated others who warned against polygamy as a foregone conclusion to the “marriage for all” movement are now supporting a legal recognition of polyandry, even daring to label this as a “family”.
The tyranny of individualistic desires is constantly gained at the expense of those who are the most vulnerable. The “happiness” expressed by the “trouple” of men is factitious, and doesn’t take into account the underlying issue of children that will certainly be demanded by virtue of their so-called “family”.
by NexDev | June 14, 2017 | Uncategorized
Born as a female, Trystan Reese is a transgender American individual, due to give birth in July. He started taking hormones years ago, keeping the uterus intact, but stopped hormonal treatment when “he” learned “he” was pregnant.
The baby is due in July, and Trystan Reese explains the situation in a video. Yet, several different French and foreign headlines are titled: “A man to give birth”. Trystan Reese’s partner is a man, Biff Chaplow; and they have adopted two children. Interviewed by CNN, Biff Chaplow states: “The more the pregnancy progresses, the more obvious it is that it’s not just a guy with a beer belly”.
This is not the first case to be reported. In 2013, a child was born to a transgender German. Thomas Beattie is another example, who became popular in France from the Secret Story program in 2016. He declared in 2008 being “the first pregnant man in history” and that he had had 3 children.
Researchers found that in a small sample of 41 transgender persons, pregnancy occurred (in females declared as being male on the civil registry) and 80% had used their own eggs.
Tugdual Derville, Alliance VITA’s General Delegate:
« Beside the way matters are presented, we must keep in mind James Hugues’ statement, when he was the executive director for the international transhumanists association: ‘Transsexuals are the first transhumanists’. It is one thing to recognize a person’s genuine suffering regarding his or her sexual identity, and quite another to pretend that a man can give birth. In this case it is a woman who took hormones to have a more masculine appearance (a deeper voice and facial hair), but she still remains capable of becoming a mother. This maternity precisely demonstrates her feminine status. The manner in which some media deal with this subject confirms the previously mentioned fraud: the idea is to use these persons who experience sexual identity disorders as a Trojan horse to rub out in people’s mind the difference between men and women, and to destroy masculine and feminine identities. The source of complementarity between men and women lies in their difference as father and mother. This distinction encourages us to defend maternity as an exclusively feminine feature of humanity. Allowing a person to define himself or herself, even going as far as soliciting scientific and legal support to respond to a personal desire, using artificial means (in this case pretending to be a man, but still using a functional uterus) continually contributes to further develop “gender trouble”, which is the title of Judith Butler’s famous queer manifesto. Again the victims in this scenario are those who are the most vulnerable.”
by NexDev | June 9, 2017 | Medically Assisted Procreation
During his press conference on June 7, 2017, Jean-François Delfraissy, as president of the French National Consultative Ethics Committee (“CCNE”) announced that the Committee will render its decision on the controversial subject of ART for single women and for lesbian partners by the end of the month.
The new French president approves of assisted reproductive technology (ART) for single women, and lesbian couples, but specifies that he prefers advocating a pedagogical process by awaiting the CCNE’s decision. Due to numerous oppositions, this decision has been on hold since 2013, particularly with repercussions from the same-sex marriage law. In January 2013, the CCNE held an overall review to reflect on societal developments for ART. Then in March 2013, CCNE’s previous president, Jean-Claude Ameisen, convoked a General Assembly, which never took place, to review all the issues associated with ART. Four years later, we are still waiting for this notorious decision from the CCNE.
In France, ART is currently only allowed for male-female couples who have been medically diagnosed with infertility. Assisted reproduction may serve as a comforting measure but it does not “heal” couples. Insemination and in vitro fertilization (IVF) with donor involve serious ethical issues such as excess embryo production and/or depriving individuals of part of their biological origins. The European Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology and Reproductive Biology recently published an article by European specialists who criticize the overuse in performing unwarranted IVF procedures, and the profits from its commercialization and reimbursement.
In February 2016, the Senate’s information report on the consequences of ART and surrogacy abroad, concluded that ART should not be offered to same-sex couples because if implemented, it would eliminate the clause for the requirement of medical infertility, and sexual complementarity (alterity) would turn the French concept of ART upside-down, and pave the way for the “right to have a child” and “artificial reproduction of convenience”. In 2009 when the bioethical laws were undergoing review, the Council of State, had also rejected the act of deliberately depriving a child from his father.
In March 2017, the French newspaper, “Le Monde” published an editorial column signed by doctors who admitted to having broken the law, particularly by performing ART with anonymous donors for single women, thus simultaneously playing the part of judge and jury.
This lobbying is detrimental to having unbiased and meaningful debates on such a sensitive topic, which should primarily be focused on children’s rights.
Professor Jean-François Mattei, author of the first bioethics law, strongly criticized this act, and emphasized its effect on the doctor’s role. « Is their role to care for patients; or to respond to every extraneous medical request?” These doctors’ actions convey the idea that one has a « right to a child », « thus categorizing children as objects. » This same viewpoint was voiced by Jacques Toubon, the Equal Rights Defender, when auditioned by the Senate in 2015: he recommended eliminating the requirement for infertility, and only keeping the clause for the “desire to become parents”, thus paving the way for surrogacy, while totally ignoring children’s rights.
Besides the serious injustice of intentionally depriving a child from his biological parents and his genealogy, important issues need to be addressed such as: donor anonymity, reimbursing unnecessary medical procedures, and increasing business prospects for the ART market. French children born from anonymous gamete donors founded the Anonymous Medical Procreation Association, to reveal the system’s wrongdoings. In 2008 “Fathered by an unknown sperm donor” by Arthur Kermevelsen was published and shed light on the difficulties and feelings of injustice that certain children experience.
Alliance VITA’s opinion:
This constitutes a serious attack on the protection of children’s rights: substituting the idea of « medical » infertility to that of “societal” infertility, and eliminating the requirement for couples to be formed between a man and a woman. Caroline Roux, as coordinator for the association’s hotline listening center emphasizes that “this is double punishment for children: starting from the original mistreatment of purposefully depriving them of their biological origins, plus cutting them off from any paternal relationship. Furthermore, with the tactic of non-discrimination, this will inevitably lead to men demanding surrogacy.”
Alliance VITA implores public authorities to have a stronger commitment to infertility research and to implement genuine prevention policies in this area.
by NexDev | June 9, 2017 | End of life, Palliative care
At the end of May the French Society for Counselling and Palliative Care (“SFAP”) published 4 documents on its website, which were submitted to the French National Authority for Health (HAS). The intended goal is to update Palliative Care guidelines, after the Claeys-Leonetti law was voted on February 2, 2016.
These documents include three “benchmark guidelines” and a chart of guidelines for practicing sedation.
1° one benchmark guideline is to determine whether or not the situation is life-threatening and the criteria for defining “impending death”.
Heated debates were held in the French National Assembly concerning this controversial and very subjective term of « impending death ». The definition specified by the “SFAP” working group reads: “Formulating a prognosis for impending death corresponds to life-expectancy in terms of several hours to several days.” In its’ Good Practice Guidelines, the “SFAP” cautions against profound sedation which could last for weeks if the prognosis is erroneous, and thus sets a maximum two-week limit.
2° a benchmark guideline for refractory pain
Pain is defined as refractory when “all available and appropriate therapeutic measures and accompaniment procedures do not alleviate the patient’s distress, or lead to intolerable undesirable side-effects, or when therapeutic measures are not expected to have an effect within an acceptable time span.”
3° a benchmark guideline for the choice of sedatives
The “SFAP” primarily advocates the use of midazolam (for example Hypnovel) and gives very specific terms and conditions for its use: administration, titration, associated painkillers, patient monitoring, etc.
4° the « SEDAPALL » chart
This document describes the palliative care sedatives administered at the end-of-life, focusing on the intention of the decision, while emphasizing that sedatives must only be administered to relieve the patient from refractory pain, “All other intentions are excluded (especially for shortening the patient’s life span, regardless of whether it motivated by compassion, or requested by the patient.)
All these documents have one point in common: each and every decision for profound and continuous sedation until death must imperatively be subjected to a collegial panel discussion.
