Should Quebec's medical aid in dying law be extended to cover Alzheimer’s patients?
The vast majority of caregivers – 91 per cent of them -- believe it should be.
The Quebec Federation of Alzheimer's Groups unveiled a study of 306 close caregivers of Alzheimer's patients on Thursday. The study revealed that nine of ten caregivers surveyed said the law should be changed to cover Alzheimer's patients in the terminal stages of the diseases if they expressed their wishes clearly beforehand in writing.
Under the current law, people diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease don't have the right to ask for medically assisted death unless they are in the terminal phase of the disease.
By the time they are in the terminal phase, however, they are often deemed to be no longer psychologically able to make the request.
The current Quebec medical aid in dying law only allows those who have explicitly decided for themselves, in full possession of their mental faculties, that they want that option.
Caregivers, though, say that is not most people affected by Alzhemer's, and that such patients tend to progress gradually and may not have consented to their end-of-life-care when they were fully mentally competent.
Quebec Health Minister Gaetan Barrette told CTV he is reflecting on how to respond to a federal directive that laws adapt to what Ottawa calls ‘a death that is reasonably predictable’
Quebec government officials call that difficult to apply, but said they are thinking about and are consulting with interested parties. They are open to changing the law but so far have made no indication if or when they will do that at this point.
In the first 6 months after the law was introduced last year, 461 Quebecers availed themselves of the choice, a number higher than predicted.
