Disabled 41-Year-Old Man is Euthanized After Funding for Home Health Care Runs Out
Canadian Sean Tagert, aged 41, was killed by assisted suicide after health officials decided to cut the funding for his in-home care hours.
Mr Tagert suffered from Motor Neurone Disease (MND) which is known in Canada as Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). His illness reduced his ability to move his body, eat or speak, however his mental awareness remained unaffected. Doctors recommended 24-hour in-home care to support Mr Tagert.
However, Vancouver Coastal Health, initially only offered Mr Tagert 15.5 hours of care a day, which was then raised to 20 hours a day, meaning that Mr Tagert was forced to pay $263.50 a day for the remaining care that he needed to survive.
Welcome to the great Canadian healthcare system
According to Grandin Media, on social media, Mr Tagert wrote a status which explained that two Vancouver Coastal Health officials visited his home and confirmed that they were cutting funding for his already inadequate care hours.
After receiving this news Mr Tagert wrote a number of devastating social media status’s which read: “So last Friday I officially submitted my medically assisted death paperwork, with lawyers and doctors, everything is in proper order. It’s been a month since I submitted my appeal to the Vancouver Coastal Health patient care quality department. They didn’t even respond….Welcome to the great Canadian healthcare system.”
Mr Tagert was killed by assisted suicide on August 6th.
Canada is home to some of the world’s most sinister euthanasia and assisted suicide laws, as even those without a terminal illness or those suffering from a mental illness are eligible to be killed by a medically assisted death.
Since Canada legalised euthanasia in 2016, there have been at least 6,749 cases of medically assisted deaths, with over 803 dead in the first 6 months of legalisation. 2018 saw Canada’s euthanasia figures soar with over 3000 Canadians killed by their doctor.
When the right to die becomes the duty to die
A ComRes poll found that nearly half of the British population is concerned that if the option of ending one’s life was made legal, some people would feel pressurised into killing themselves.
It is becoming increasingly evident that suicide laws could lead to vulnerable people seeing suicide as a treatment option, so as not to be a burden to others.
In a recent debate in the House Commons, MP Lynn McInnes expressed her concern at the very realistic possibility of the vulnerable being pressurised to die. Ms McInnes said: “My concern is that in the current climate, at a time of over-stretched NHS budgets and massively under-funded social care, if assisted dying was legalised, it would begin to be seen as an alternative to treatment and to care. There is a very real risk of a subtle yet dangerous culture change, in which vulnerable, terminally ill patients, come to see assisted dying as a treatment option, and indeed the best way to stop themselves becoming a burden to their families, to the NHS and to wider society.”
MP Jim Shannon also stated during the debate, that “the ‘right to die’ for the eloquent and well off would become a duty to die for the poor and vulnerable.”
We have a duty to protect the vulnerable
Director of SPUC’s Patients First Network, Antonia Tully said: “If assisted dying is legalised in Britain it could lead to a reduction in the quality of healthcare and risks promoting death as an alternative to medical treatment. We have a duty to protect the vulnerable, who deserve good healthcare and respect.”
Ms Tully continued: “Mr Tagert’s story should serve as a glaring warning to our MPs that assisted dying can make vulnerable people even more vulnerable. Assisted suicide is an inhumane response to suffering. It is a dangerous route to go down.”
LifeNews Note: Courtesy of SPUC. The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children is a leading pro-life organization in the United Kingdom.
Filed under: General Problems
This isn’t just the case in Canada; Oregon, the great “death with dignity” state, will much more readily prescribe opiates for suicide than for pain –maybe especially when the person asking for them would want to keep living if they could get their pain adequately treated &thus want to continue living. For such a touchy-feely woowoo state, this place has strong currents of Nazism, specifically the “get rid of the unproductives” idea.
Actually, this is not a “biased” story. Unfortunately, it’s true. This man had ALS, had a heart attack a couple of years ago and needed 24 hour care. He had partial custody of his young son and could NOT relocate. Basically, the govt told him his life wasn’t important and gave him the “choice” to live with under-treatment of a horrific disease or to leave his young son and move away.
It’s one thing to believe that adults of sound mind with horrific and painful illnesses should have the choice of a peaceful life and death with dignity but another when the govt chooses death. Again, by denying this man the care he needed and deserved, the govt told him his life was not worth anything. I’m stunned that anyone could support this.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/als-bc-man-medically-assisted-death-1.5244731
Although I sympathise with this man’s suffering he did have the choice of 24 hour nursing care in a place that is equipped to address his needs.
The article is extremely incorrect and biased. I have no idea if there is a country in the world who provides free 24 hour in home care. Such care would have to be available to every single person who has any illness and expressed a desire to remain in home. This would include many people in retirement homes, evert person in nursing homes and every hospice patient. I would love if we could provide this level of service to our sick and dying but the cost would be so enormous that we would have no money left for anything else.
Currently only those with a terminal illness expected to die in the very near future can access assisted dying services. The Supreme Court stated that any1 with intense suffering should be able to access it but the Government implemented a law that contradicts this and the law will be appealed in court. There is nothing sinister about it except that not every1 can use it.
This reporting is leading people to believe that this man died because he could not afford to live. People on FB have make comments against Universal Health Care as a result which is too bad as leaving people sick and dying without proper care is certainly more sinister than a law designed to end suffering when one wants to die with dignity.