Canadian journalists need to significantly change how they report on medical assistance in dying (MAID) for mental illness, a new report says.
Most news articles about MAID for mental illness do not include perspectives from people with mental illnesses, the report says.
“The voice and everyday experiences of people with lived experience of mental illness were limited [in news articles],” says the report, released July 15 by the Canada Excellence Research Chair in Health Equity and Community Wellbeing at Toronto Metropolitan University.
“This absence raises concerns about the implications of MAID’s expansion for impacted communities.”
Most Canadians do not understand Canada’s MAID laws, Danielle Landry, the report’s lead author and research associate at the centre, told Canadian Affairs in an interview.
“I don’t think most Canadians are informed [about MAID],” she said. “If it was being reported on as a health issue, then maybe people would be paying more attention.”
‘People tune out’
Landry and her research team examined 367 English Canadian news articles about MAID for mental illness published between 2020 and 2024.
Most of these articles focused on federal MAID legislation, which has evolved considerably in recent years.
In March 2021, the Trudeau government passed legislation removing the requirement that a person’s death be “reasonably foreseeable” to qualify for MAID. The law said people whose only condition is a mental illness would be eligible for MAID beginning March 2023.
In March 2023, Parliament delayed the expansion of MAID for mental illness until 2024. In early 2024, Parliament delayed the expansion again until 2027.
Landry’s research team found much of the news coverage about these changes focused on political debates rather than health implications. Politicians were most often quoted and pictured, with medical experts sometimes commenting on the political developments.
“This suggests that articles are geared more towards politically astute readers, rather than informing the average Canadian about what’s at stake in this debate,” the report says.
The report recommends journalists instead report on MAID as a public health issue. Health reporting is more likely to discuss ethical and moral issues, and show how MAID impacts Canadians’ lives, Landry says.
“When [MAID is] reported on as a political news story, sometimes people tune out,” she said.
Reporting should also show MAID’s impact on communities, instead of only focusing on an individual’s experience with MAID.
“When one person accesses MAID, it has ripple effects,” said Landry.
Missing information
News reporting on MAID for mental illness also left out key details about MAID, the researchers found.
Most articles studied by the researchers did not explain the differences between Track 1 and Track 2 MAID.
Track 1 MAID is available to eligible individuals whose deaths are reasonably foreseeable, whereas Track 2 MAID is for eligible individuals whose deaths are not reasonably foreseeable. People with disabilities or incurable illnesses can be approved for Track 2 MAID, even if they are not dying.
Opinion pieces critical of MAID’s expansion were most likely to explain the differences between Track 1 and Track 2 MAID, the report says.
“If [journalists are] not bothering to explain why [Track 2 MAID] might be concerning to folks — why somebody might have an alarm bell going off around these issues — it is concerning because then [people are] not informed,” said Landry.
Canada’s Track 2 MAID laws have come under considerable scrutiny. In March, the United Nations recommended Canada scrap Track 2 MAID altogether, including allowing MAID for mental illness. Last fall, several disability organizations launched a Charter challenge against it.
People with mental illnesses have a range of opinions about whether MAID for mental illness should be allowed, says Landry, who taught in disability studies for a decade and has a personal mental health history.
Suffering
But people with mental illnesses are rarely included in news articles about MAID for mental illness, the report says. When they are, mental illness is most often described as suffering.
The study recommends journalists stop equating mental illness with suffering.
“When mental illness is repeatedly framed in the context of suffering, the framing effect could serve to reinforce notions that life with severe mental illness is not worth living,” the report says.
This allows “eugenic ideology [to] seep into public discourse,” said Landry. Eugenic ideology focuses on finding a so-called “ideal” person or race.
People’s value often becomes tied to what they can do, says Landry.
“We start to tie people’s value to their productivity,” she said. “[But] people contribute to society in a myriad of different ways. We can’t be making life or death decisions based on whether or not somebody is productive enough.”
People with mental illnesses may come to believe that they are burdens on others, she says.
In 2023, 45 per cent of Track 1 MAID patients and 49 per cent of Track 2 MAID patients reported they were suffering because they felt like a burden to others, a 2024 Health Canada report says.
Media reporting guidelines
The report also recommends Canada’s media industry develop guidelines about reporting on MAID. Guidelines about reporting on suicide — such as ones from the World Health Organization — may help to inform these guidelines, the report says.
People who have mental illnesses should also help develop these guidelines, the report says.
“It can’t just be journalists writing for journalists,” said Landry. “There actually needs to be some input from the communities that are being represented.”
These conversations need to happen now, she says.
“The clock is ticking,” she said. “It’s almost 2027. It’s really important that there is space in that public discourse in which people with lived and living experiences can … share our knowledge and experience to actually contribute to that debate.”
I’ve been waiting for the expansion of medical assistance in dying (MAiD) since Bill C-7. I have bipolar disorder and schizoaffective disorder. I’ve experienced severe psychosis and delusions that left me restrained in isolation; I literally lost the ability to speak because I was so deeply delusional. My thoughts were racing so fast that I ended up isolated in a psychiatric ward. I’ve taken what feels like a million pills in my lifetime.
I’ve lived through extremely difficult phases. During a very intense manic episode, I walked 75 kilometers without stopping. I triggered an alarm because I falsely believed a company was in danger. I once tried to immolate myself with gas, though I didn’t ignite it—I was completely psychotic. I’ve attempted suicide twice because I hear voices. I’m treatment-resistant and now rely on injections. I’ve never been able to work because it’s simply beyond my capacity.
I struggle with antipsychotic medication—I vomit in the morning, suffer from insomnia, and live with paranoia. People rarely talk about how unbearable psychological suffering can be, just like physical suffering. Yet I’ve been in treatment for a long time—I’ve endured this psychotic state for 23 years. I also live with anxiety.
Waiting for the law to change is a true nightmare. I’m grateful there’s a legal challenge underway to make it possible, because I believe the current situation is discriminatory. I’ve also suffered broken fingers while trying to work, and I’ve been sexually assaulted.
This is my story. I’m waiting for the law to be expanded so I can finally have the dignity to end my life.
I do not blame you. I am extremely exhausted , but in my case, I cannot make friends anymore. I wish I can change my name, voice, body, face so nobody recognize me as I am a piece of trash, a so call friend told me that saying that is that I am in pain and agony reason that I am desperately want to leave this earth, the medical profession never tells you why they want you to live it is more barbaric delay MAID for mental illness.
Look up a place called the euthanasia prevention coalition. They’ll give you what’s at stake. And they’ll tell you from ordinary people’s perspectives. I know they’re right, because they’ve been around for 20 years or so.
Length of time that something has been around is no indication of how right it is. Slavery is a great example. So is apartheid. I went to the site you mentioned and it took only one article to see how biased the site is, calling euthanasia centers “killing sites”. We need balanced perspectives to make the best decisions, not propaganda – that helps nobody.
I agree with Laura’s comments regarding the length of time as a poor indicator of whether something is right or wrong. I also looked up the site that you mentioned and quickly saw that it was very biased. The site compares the 1939 killings in Germany to MAID, and that seems to me to be a bit of a stretch. The site also mentions that the Canadian government might approve MAID for children. I see no evidence of this, and conclude that the site is using fear as a motivator, along with a shortage of fact.
MAiD assessors are not equipped to assess all the mental disorders listed in the latest DMS-5-TR let alone know what successful treatments exist and how available they are for anyone trying to access MAiD.
https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/mental-disorders
https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/mental-disorders
The only way a Track 2 could be designed is to accept whatever applicants say is their experience of living with mental illness, their reasoning for applying, and to grant the request. And I don’t see any government eager to go in this direction. The only hope for someone with a mental illness per the DMS is to also have an acceptable Track 1 life-ending disease.
The second most requested Track 2 diseases is Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS). ME/CFS has double the disease burden of HIV and has no treatment.
ME/CFS is a biological energy-limiting disease driven by T Cell Exhaustion, Low ATP, and Mitochondrial dysfunction.
The most severe ME/CFS patients are unable to walk, unable to talk, unable to read, and unable to eat. Due to the lack of medical education and lack of medical infrastructures for ME/CFS patients, ME/CFS patients often die from neglect and abuse in hospitals. They are refused feeding tubes and left to die without nutrition and hydration. ME/CFS patient medical needs are similar to ALS patients and MS patients, but they are being denied that same medical care.
At least 1/2 of LongCovid patients meet the criteria for ME/CFS. ME/CFS rates are rising in most countries. However, in 2020, Canada was recorded as having 600,000 ME/CFS patients, with half of LongCovid patients having ME/CFS, the number of ME/CFS patients in Canada ought to be somewhere around 2 Million.
However, the number of ME/CFS patients now quoted in 2025 is 444,000, a decrease in patients, rather than an increase patients.
It’s impossible not to wonder what the truth is here. Has the number of ME/CFS patients in Canada drastically decreased due to Track 2 MAID? Or is someone trying to deny the increase of ME/CFS patients due to Covid? What’s the real story here?
ME/CFS has 16 diagnostic blood tests in development. A Canadian, Dr. Alain Moreau is working on 4 of them, however, he is doing so without ME/CFS being funded to disease burden and prevalence.
I have a mental health disability which prevents me from working. I’m also nearing age 65, which means my disability benefits will be automatically cut off. After that, I will receive so little in senior benefits that I’ll be forced to choose between food and a place to live. I don’t get enough money now to save for the future, especially with the cost of groceries going up. I feel like I have two MAID targets on my back (age and disability), and that my life is a countdown to my 65th birthday. After that, the only future I will have is choosing between death and starvation on the street. Living like this is oppressive, to say the least.
When I post articles or concerns about MAID on social media, I see the effects of the biased media coverage described in this article. Invariably I’m personally attacked by uninformed and/or biased members of the public who know nothing about MAID other than what the “news” media tells them. I’m angrily accused of “depriving suffering people of their right to die” or “being cruel to terminally ill people.” They also tell tales (real or made up) of “relatives” or “someone they know” who had a wonderful peaceful MAID death, or who were unfairly denied MAID and forced to suffer.
I try to reason with some of them, explaining Track 1 vs Track 2 or posting links to articles. Every time, they just curse me out and shut me down. People don’t want to know the truth about Track 2 MAID or who its victims are. I don’t know if this level of hostility and denial is due to media brainwashing, or an instinctive fear of ending up having to make the same horrible choice I will have to make in less than 5 years.