An employee of Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) who allegedly suggested military veterans consider euthanasia is no longer employed by the department.
Erika Lashbrook Knutson, spokesperson for Minister of Veterans Affairs Lawrence MacAulay, said privacy rules prevent the government from disclosing whether the female employee was fired or resigned. She was first suspended.
“We had to follow to the letter the process laid out in the collective agreement with the union,” she said on Dec. 20.“That kind of a process has some pretty rigid requirements on privacy and non-disclosure. But as of today, that employee is no longer an employee.”
In November, MacAulay testified before a House of Commons veterans affairs committee meeting that a VAC investigation discovered as many as four Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) veterans were offered assisted suicide when they contacted an agent for help, but said it was an isolated incident with a single Veterans Affairs agent.
MacAulay was informed during the committee meeting on Nov. 24 of a fifth allegation of a veteran being offered unsolicited medical assistance in dying (MAID) by VAC, of which MacAulay said he was unaware.
MPs on the same committee heard from another veteran just over a week later who alleged that she, too, was offered unprompted MAiD by VAC.
MacAulay was asked by the committee whether or not the agent was still under his department’s employ, but he did not answer directly.
“I can tell you that this employee has no interaction with veterans,” he said on Nov. 24, a statement that was echoed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau a week later.
“The individual who made recommendations to veterans around medical assistance in dying is no longer working with veterans,” Trudeau told reporters on Dec. 1.
MacAulay offered an apology to veterans, explaining such interactions create instances of “sanctuary trauma” and that the department is retraining front-line staff.
“I am sorry you had to endure these appalling interactions, and we’re doing everything we can to ensure this never happens again,” he said.
Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre posted on Twitter on Dec. 19: “Instead of offering services or help that will make them well, this Liberal government is offering Canadian veterans assisted suicide. We should not be a country that abandons our heroes.”
In response to Poilievre’s comments, MacAulay posted on Twitter on Dec. 19: “This is incredibly false and harmful misinformation. Veterans Affairs Canada does not offer medical assistance in dying to Veterans, never has and never will.”
“All Veterans can and should feel safe coming to Veterans Affairs Canada for the support they need and deserve. The political games Pierre Poilievre and the Conservatives are playing with Veterans is harmful and wrong,” MacAulay said in a follow-up tweet.
The legislation in Canada surrounding assisted suicide and euthanasia, more commonly called physician-assisted death, MAID, or assisted dying by those in favour of the practice, requires discussions about euthanasia to be limited to the patient and their primary medical care provider, on threat of up to a 14-year prison sentence.
The department said new training implemented in August has made it clear case managers and service agents can only discuss assisted suicide if the purpose is to mention impacts on benefits for the veteran’s family. If a veteran brings up discussion of MAID, a supervisor is supposed to be notified.
The investigation arose after Global News reported that a former armed forces member who asked Veterans Affairs for assistance was told to consider assisted suicide. The veteran was asking for treatment help for post-traumatic stress and a traumatic brain injury. His identity has not been made public.
The veteran said the agent he talked to told him she had helped another veteran obtain MAID, and that former CAF member ultimately ended his life after those discussions.
Post-Traumatic Stress
The veteran told Global News he had repeatedly asked the employee to stop bringing it up, but she continued mentioning assisted suicide.
After questioning by the committee, MacAulay confirmed that one veteran who was counselled about MAID by a government agent did decide to have a medically assisted suicide.
Just one day prior to the committee hearing, an active CAF member called into the Tango Romeo podcast with host Mark Meincke, and said he was offered MAID when he wanted help with post-traumatic stress disorder.
“I wasn’t expecting them to let me know ‘Hey, we had recently won litigation to assist members with MAID (medical assistance in dying), and you know that’s always an option,'” said the veteran.
Meincke testified before the veterans affairs committee that the veteran stated that “in his original phone call where he was offered MAID, [he was told] ‘we can do it for you, because we’ve done it before, and one veteran that we’ve done this for, after we completed MAID, after we killed him, we now have supports in place for his wife and two children.
He added that the caseworker allegedly told the veteran that MAID was a better alternative to “blowing your brains out.”
An investigation started in August ultimately found that one case manager had suggested MAID to four different veterans since 2019, and she was subsequently moved into a different position where she would not be dealing directly with veterans and subsequently suspended.
Retired corporal and former Paralympian Christine Gauthier came forward stating she also talked to the Veterans Affairs employee and MAID was brought up while she was asking for help to build a wheelchair ramp at her home. Gauthier suffered permanent damage to her knees and spine in 1989, after jumping in a deep hole while training on an obstacle course.
She testified before a parliamentary committee that the case worker offered her assisted suicide and even offered to supply the equipment.
“It was just getting too much and unbearable. And the person at VAC mentioned at that point, ‘Well, you know that we can assist you with assisted dying now if you’d like.‘ And I was just shocked because I was like, ’Are you serious?' Like that easy, you’re going to be helping me to die but you won’t help me to live?” she said.
Referred to RCMP
“I have a letter saying that, ‘If you were so desperate, madam, we can offer you medical assistance in dying,'” Gauthier told the committee in French on Dec. 1.
MacAulay said the reports had been referred to the RCMP for a potential investigation.
“I can’t speak for the RCMP,” he said.“But the fact is, it’s in their hands and they will do it.”
“I’m certainly now aware of at least eight veterans who have had this occur and there has been at least three additional case managers or core service agents involved in this,” said Conservative MP Blake Richards during a Commons veterans affairs committee meeting on Dec. 5.
Assisted suicide has been allowed in Canada since 2016, and the legislation was amended again in March 2021. A physician or nurse practitioner can directly administer intravenous lethal doses of drugs to cause death, or health care professionals can provide drugs directly to the patient that they can take themselves to cause their own death.
There are criteria to obtain a medically assisted death, including that a patient must be over 18, voluntarily make a request to receive the drugs, and have a “grievous and irremediable medical condition” defined as an irreversible state of decline with a serious illness, disease or disability, and experience “unbearable” physical and mental suffering.
The condition does not have to be fatal or terminal.
Veterans: High Suicide Risk
By March 17, 2023, the definition of a “grievous and irremediable medical condition” was set to be expanded to include mental illness, even if that is the only medical condition the patient suffers from, but that move has since been delayed.
Justice Minister David Lametti said the government needed more time to set up standards for dealing with assisted suicide requests for those with mental illness.
A joint parliamentary committee is studying whether MAID criteria should be further expanded still, to include mature minors and advance requests.
Veterans have a “significantly higher” risk of death by suicide, especially if young and male, than the general Canadian population, according to a Veteran Suicide Mortality Study. Male veterans overall had a 1.4 times higher risk of dying by suicide compared to the general male Canadian population, with the youngest group at highest risk, found the study.
Female veterans overall had a 1.9 times higher risk of dying by suicide compared to the general female Canadian population, and this risk was relatively consistent across age groups.
Statistically, in the last 10 years, more veterans in Canada died by suicide than the total number of Canadian Forces soldiers killed during the 20-year war in Afghanistan, from Oct. 7, 2001, to Aug. 30, 2021, according to figures from the Department of National Defence.
Peter Wilson and The Canadian Press contributed to this report.
