Researcher pens concerns on ‘health-care serial killers’ abusing Canada's assisted dying program

Canadian providers described assisted suicide as 'heartwarming,' according to one study. One said they almost received 'an adrenaline rush' from the procedure.

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  • August 12, 2024
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Researcher pens concerns on ‘health-care serial killers’ abusing Canada's assisted dying program
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A controversial paper says Canada’s assisted suicide regime may cover for medical practitioners with "serially homicidal personalities." He provided no evidence to substantiate his claims.

"Canada’s MAID [medical assistance in dying] system is criticized as the most permissive or least safeguarded in the world, raising the question of whether it could protect patients who fit the clinical profile of adult victims of HSK (health-care serial killers) from a killer working as a MAID provider," wrote Christopher Lyon, a Canadian social scientist who teaches at the University of York.

His father accessed MAID in 2021 after bouts of depression and suicidal ideation. They believe he was not properly assessed, reported the National Post. 

Lyon did not say whether the practitioner responsible should be charged with murder or manslaughter. 

"I want to be clear: I’m not calling anybody out there a murderer or a serial killer in a culpable sense," Lyon said in an interview. No police investigations or criminal charges are known.

The newly published paper chalked up poor vetting, surveillance and oversight, as cause for concern. It also condemned authorities for failing to act on concerns raised by suspicious colleagues and other witnesses.

Lyon wrote that "health-care serial killers" go undetected for considerable periods, claiming MAID provides "added opportunities for killing." Criminal Code exemptions designate the procedure as a "non-culpable" form of homicide. That is not considered an offence, he wrote.

To be eligible for MAID, a person must be 18 years of age and mentally sound. Applicants must also be in an advanced state of decline from a "serious and incurable" illness or disability.

Each patient attempting to access the procedure must be assessed by two doctors or nurse practitioners before they can access assisted suicide.

Quebec’s commission on end-of-life care reported that, from 2021-2022, 15 deaths out of 3,663 were non-compliant with provincial or federal MAID laws.

However, Lyon contends oversight and delivery need a "radical restructuring" to mitigate the possibility of abuses, he said.

"Whatever one’s views are on MAID, it should be foremost in our minds that, at a basic level, we are empowering a privileged class of people to poison disabled and distressed people to death," he said.

"Disabled people have been raising the risks of MAID being attractive to 'angel of death' characters for a very long time."

He warned of the repurchasing of not having an oversight system to independently review MAID requests and "determining what, where and how deaths are reported varies between jurisdictions."

"It should be transparent — transparency around providers, their numbers, the kinds of patients they administer to and how the assessments were done."

Some MAID assessors avoid capacity assessments altogether, instead relying on their "gut feelings," Lyon notes.

Euthanasia "is fundamentally homicide by lethal injection," the author wrote. In most jurisdictions, doctors are prohibited, or strongly discouraged, from raising assisted dying as a form of medical care.

Pro-actively suggesting MAID, "gives somebody who is enjoying this the licence to seek new opportunities to do this," Lyon said. "If you believe very strongly in it, or you’ve been given the power to do this, some people might take advantage of that."

Former Ontario long-term care nurse Elizabeth Wettlaufer killed eight care home residents via lethal injection over a nine-year period, sparking controversy. They were not related to the assisted suicide regime

"One of the reasons healthcare serial killers are often hard to detect is because they are so often not nightmarish," Lyon said. "Some are even well-regarded by some of their colleagues, who defend them in disbelief."

Canadian MAID providers described the delivery of a medical death as "heartwarming," according to one study.  Others called it "the most important medicine I do," "liberating," and "an ultimate act of compassion."

One said they received "almost an adrenaline rush" for performing the procedure. "I was surprised at how good I felt," they said. 

Lyon found the language detestable. There should be a "standardized script" for presenting MAID to patients, he said.

"So, you can’t say that death is 'beautiful,' or 'elegant.' You have to present how the person dies by MAID, the risks involved, what is known and not known about it so that you can’t impose your subjective views on it," Lyon wrote.

"Like MAID providers, some health-care serial killers strongly believe they are helping and relieving suffering. MAID seems to provide the perfect legal cover for these personalities," he said.

"When you are giving somebody a legally protected status that allows them to kill, we should ask hard questions about what happens to a person when they’re given that power, how they might use it, what that power might do to that person and who might be drawn to that power, and why."

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