end of life

Rasouli’s consent required to withdraw life support, SCC rules

Mr. Rasouli has been in a persistent vegetative state at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre (“Sunnybrook”) since October 2010. For the past three years, he has been kept alive by way of mechanical ventilation and artificial nutrition and hydration. His doctors saw no prospect of recovery, and sought to withdraw Mr. Rasouli’s life support in order […]

BULLETIN: B.C. Court of Appeal’s decision in Carter v. Canada to be released today

On June 15, 2012, Justice Smith of the British Columbia Supreme Court effectively created an exception to the Criminal Code to allow for physician-assisted suicide. The trial judgement Carter v. Canada (Attorney General) was discussed briefly in a previous post on The Court. Justice Smith gave Parliament a year to amend the laws surrounding assisted suicide, and the Government of Canada appealed […]