6 Takeaways From the Long-Awaited Report on Euthanasia Expansion for the Mentally Ill

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A special parliamentary committee has tabled its long-awaited report on whether the federal government should expand its medical assistance in dying (MAID) regime to include Canadians whose sole underlying condition is a mental illness.

The report’s recommendation has wide implications for the future of the controversial procedure in Canada, as the prime minister and justice minister have both said they would wait until the committee’s recommendation before deciding whether to proceed with expanding MAID eligibility.

The federal government has already delayed expansion several times, but MAID is currently on track to be expanded to include the mentally ill on March 17, 2027, unless the expansion provision is scrapped.

Here are six takeaways from the report.

Recommend Against Expansion

The Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying’s June 17 report contains a single recommendation, which is that the federal government “indefinitely exclude” individuals whose sole medical condition is a mental illness from MAID eligibility.

According to the report, the committee found through its meetings with clinicians, academics, government officials, legal and international experts, and ordinary Canadians that there is a “divergence of perspectives” on whether Canada is ready to expand the procedure to include the mentally ill.

While some witnesses said the country will be ready to expand MAID by March 2027, others told the committee that the conditions have yet to be met. These include establishing evidence-based criteria for determining eligibility, having an adequately resourced mental health system, or establishing stringent safeguards.

“Finally, for some, the [MAID] expansion should never proceed, under any circumstances. Many recognized that these issues are difficult, challenging and consequential for Canadians,” the report said.

The committee said Ottawa could allow the planned expansion of MAID to the mentally ill, further delay it, put a permanent prohibition on it, or refer the issue to the Supreme Court to rule on the constitutionality of such an exclusion.

Concerns Over ‘Irremediability’

An issue cited by the report was how to determine the irremediability of an individual’s mental illness, given that eligibility requires applicants to have a “grievous and irremediable medical condition.”

Many of the witnesses were divided on whether it is possible to assess the irremediability of mental disorders, with one assistant clinical professor at the University of Alberta stating there is no way to “reliably distinguish in practice those rare cases where suffering is truly irremediable from those where despair may yet be treatable.”

Another psychiatrist noted that one individual who requested MAID would have met the eligibility criteria,but has since made improvements to his health and now has a will to live. Several other witnesses told the committee that their mental health issues had improved over time.

There was also a divide among witnesses on whether reasonable MAID requests could be differentiated from temporary suicidality. One psychiatrist said suicide-risk evaluations are a “regular feature of medicine,” while other experts said differentiating between MAID requests and suicidality was “not framed by clear guidance, was inherently difficult or was altogether impossible.”

More Mental Health Supports Needed

A recurring theme of the testimonials to the committee was that Canada needed to ensure better access to mental health services. Some said Canada had an obligation to provide access to these services before giving Canadians MAID.

Witnesses noted that the growth of the number of psychiatrists has not kept pace with the growth in the number of family health practitioners, that 10 percent of people wait six months or more for mental health care, and that a 2025 survey found 41 percent of mentally ill adults said their needs were not being met at all or only being partially met.

Some witnesses also warned that expanding MAID could lead to the “suicide contagion effect,” which has been seen in some jurisdictions that have MAID, where suicide rates increase following legalization.

However, two experts suggested that expanding MAID to the mentally ill could paradoxically help them to connect with additional treatment and supports, which may allow them to recover and no longer seek the procedure.

Vulnerable Groups

Several experts noted that expanding MAID to the mentally ill would likely disproportionately end the lives of women, in the same way that Track 2 MAID—which applies to people whose natural death is not reasonably foreseeable—has led to disabled women disproportionately seeking euthanasia.

Health Canada data showed that nearly 60 percent of all Track 2 deaths from 2022 to 2024 were women. One law professor said that there is a link between “male violence and mental illness and suicidality in women,” and that Canada should expend more resources providing “better supports for women with mental illness to escape male violence.”

One expert representing Indigenous Disability Canada said that mental health funding is often insufficient in First Nations communities and that Health Canada consultation had “garnered little uptake” among indigenous participants.

A representative from Inclusion Canada told the committee that many of the people the group represents feel the availability of Track 2 MAID “is discriminatory about their lives and their lives not being worth living or being worth saving.”

However, a representative from Dying with Dignity Canada read out testimonials from individuals suffering from chronic and incurable mental health issues, who supported the expansion of MAID.

“When a person is in immense mental pain and no treatment can help them, under the current system people are left to suffer grievously, which is cruel and unusual punishment,” one wrote.

Conservatives Hail Report

After the tabling of the committee’s report, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said his party had “forced Liberals to back down from MAID for mental illness” and “stopped government from telling struggling people to give up on life.”

Tory MP Tamara Jansen called it a “good day,” as the recommendation to pause the expansion of MAID would save “thousands of lives.”

Jansen encouraged MPs to vote in favour of her private member’s bill C-218, which would amend the Criminal Code to permanently repeal the scheduled expansion of MAID for Canadians whose sole medical condition is a mental illness.

The Tories are also recommending stronger MAID monitoring and public reporting, minimal national standards for oversight, updated guidance and training around the procedure, and a review of whether current MAID safeguards are protecting vulnerable Canadians.

Conservative MP Andrew Lawton, who previously experienced mental health struggles and attempted suicide in his 20s, told reporters that he might not have “been here today” if the planned expansion of MAID for the mentally ill had existed at that time.

Liberal Government to Respond

While the Liberal government had initially intended to expand MAID to the mentally ill on March 17, 2023, it announced in December 2022 that it would be delaying the expansion. In 2024, the government again delayed the expansion by three more years, until 2027.

Prime Minister Mark Carney said in May 2026 that he would wait for the release of a parliamentary report on MAID before deciding whether to expand it to the mentally ill. Justice Minister Sean Fraser said he would do the same.

A spokesperson for the Justice Department told The Epoch Times that MPs will have until July 11 to provide feedback on the report and that Fraser will wait until after that date to announce the government’s decision on expanding MAID eligibility.