False Claim: MAiD Providers “regularly prescribe experimental drug compounds at lethal doses”
This is not a typical rebuttal of MAiD misinformation, mainly because the source is the American political news outlet The Hill, and the target is jurisdictions that allow physician-assisted death in the United States, not Canada. However, the article references the Canadian Association of MAiD Assessors and Providers (CAMAP) in the second paragraph, so it will almost certainly be confused with — and used to attack — MAiD practice in Canada.
The central claim is that medications used for assisted dying in American states are not authorized or approved specifically for assisted dying, and are used in such high doses that they amount to “state-sanctioned assisted suicide experiments,” with high rates of complications and even failed deaths.
The article also makes much of the fact that some of these medications are not specifically approved for assisted dying, and that they are used in very high doses. But off-label medication use is common throughout medicine. A drug not being approved for a particular indication does not mean it cannot be used safely, effectively, or appropriately for that purpose. And while the IV medications used in Canada are also given at doses intended to bring about death, critics have not provided compelling evidence that these medications, at these doses, cause the kinds of complications they imply.
But, there is some truth to one of the concerns brought up in The Hill article. There have been cases of prolonged dying in America, including one Oregon case in which death reportedly took up to 26 hours. However, those concerns do not apply to Canada, for several reasons.
The first thing to understand is that assisted dying in the United States is entirely based on self-administered oral medication. There is no IV route administered by a medical practitioner in the way there is in Canada. And in many American cases, the medication is prescribed by a doctor, taken home by the patient, and then taken later, often without any medical supervision present to manage any complications.
That is not how MAiD happens in Canada.
In Canada, the vast majority of MAiD provisions occur through the IV route, administered by a medical practitioner (99.9%+). In the rare cases where people have chosen the oral, self-administered route, the number has always been fewer than ten cases per year. In fact, according to the most recent Annual Report on MAiD from Health Canada:
“MAID was administered by a practitioner in all cases that occurred in 2024. While self-administration of MAID is permitted in all provinces and territories in Canada (except for Quebec), very few people have chosen this option since 2016.”
In 2023, there were fewer than five cases in which a person chose the oral, self-administered option. The oral self-administration of MAiD is exceedingly rare in Canada.
Second, for the very small number of people who do choose the oral route, there is always an IV backup ready in case death takes longer than the agreed-upon time — usually no more than 60 to 90 minutes. And unlike many cases in the United States, Canadian MAiD providers remain with the person until death is confirmed, ensuring any complications can be addressed immediately.
Unfortunately, there are organizations and commentators who have used, and will continue to use, stories from the United States to imply that the same concerns apply in Canada.
They do not.
The concerns raised in this article may be used to frighten people in Canada, but like so much misinformation about MAiD, they can be addressed with a little critical thinking, context, and knowledge of how MAiD actually works here.
*A brief aside is worth making here: the fact that complications and prolonged deaths can occur, however rarely, in jurisdictions that rely solely or heavily on oral self-administration without medical supervision is not an argument against Canada’s MAiD system. If anything, it is evidence of why Canada’s system is so carefully regulated and clinically managed. Canada does not face these concerns in the same way precisely because MAiD is almost always provided intravenously, by a medical practitioner, with the provider present until death is confirmed. Other jurisdictions could learn from this model by expanding access to medically administered IV MAiD, which would help prevent exactly the kinds of prolonged deaths and complications these articles describe.