Australia’s new Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill of 2023 has drawn the attention of those who wish to see assisted death opened to those under the age of 18. The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Human Rights Commission submitted an inquiry to the Voluntary Assisted Death (VAD) Committee regarding the changes made last year.
The Commission’s six-page long inquiry addresses four areas where they feel the new bill “may fall short.”
Most strikingly, the ACT Commission critiques that the bill does not make this form of suicide available to minors under age 18. It claims that “human rights principles require due consideration for the rights of children and young people, including their right to access health care without discrimination and their right to have their views taken into account.” The members feel that if the minor meets all of the requirements of the bill and also “demonstrate[s] maturity” with decision making, that the child should be allowed to request voluntary assisted death.
Their second critique suggests that people who have “an inability to communicate” or have lost the capacity to make this decision should not be disqualified from seeking assisted suicide. Instead, they feel if that person made a written request for VAD when they still had the capacity to do so, then that request should be acted upon when that person loses their capacity. They recognized the “fraught ethical issues” with this idea but encouraged the VAD committee to consider this when the bill has been in place for three years — for the sake of “human rights.”
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Thirdly, the ACT Commission critiques the amount of safeguards in place to restrict eligibility for VAD to only those who qualify and those who obtain witnesses, approval from care providers, submit a formal and final request, and submit to a final assessment by their practitioner before proceeding with their suicide. It also points out that the amount of people needed to be involved in the process is too great: the person making the request, a person to sign for those who cannot sign for themselves, a health practitioner, and two witnesses (neither of which may be a beneficiary in any way of the person’s death). It states, “a scheme whose purpose is to facilitate access to VAD in order to help individuals end their lives with dignity, and to ensure that intolerable suffering is not unnecessarily prolonged, should avoid unnecessary delays that may frustrate its purpose.”
And finally, the Commission opposes the five-day limit available for requesting a review of a denied VAD request. It reasons that five days is too short a time for someone who is terminally ill or suffering intolerably to be able to “learn about their review rights and to action them.” They suggest that the normal 28-day period be allowed in these cases.
All of this has been requested under the guise of human rights and the catchphrase “death with dignity.” Allowing children to request legal suicide is a dangerous proposition when it is known that decision-making skills are not fully developed in humans until their early twenties. Minors may also be more easily influenced or coerced by caregiver and parental decisions, friend groups, and social media — all of which may make voluntary assisted suicide appear as the best solution to their pain.
In reality, these efforts to broaden the scope of assisted death are likely to follow in Canada’s footsteps, eventually restricting life-giving and comforting health care to patients who are struggling.
