Palliative care: no stats, not essential - MAID: yes stats, yes essential

I made a request to Health Canada for this information (someone else had already submitted the ATIP):

"Request Number: A-2019-001974, Agendas, meeting notes, briefing materials, and calendar entries related to meetings between Canadian not-for-profit "Dying with Dignity Canada" and Health Canada officials between 2016 and March 2020."

The first page of the document revealed that someone in Health Canada advised that the Minister should meet Dying with Dignity soon (within a month it states). It was Important to do so. Can you imagine a pro-life group ever getting to meet with the Minister? No, me neither. But for this pro-death organization, they did get a meeting with the Minister because it was "important" to do so and it had to be done quickly. This happened in 2016.

Note that CARP (CANADIAN ASSOCIATION OF RETIRED PERSONS) also met with Health Canada in this April 2016 meeting. CARP also supports MAID.

"CARP believes the criteria under which patients can request and receive assistance in dying from a physician should be expanded."

This from the ATIP:

 The Minister of Health is apparently "determined to address mental health services and palliative care services". So I went to CIHI to see what they had on palliative care. What they had was from 2018 and nothing since then: CIHI 2018 report. 

When I asked CIHI if they had anything more recent than this 2018 report, the answer was no. When I asked them if they had any stats on palliative care, the answer was no. CIHI is the organization that publishes health statistics for Canada. They have nothing recent on the subject and no statistics. Shouldn't we be alarmed at these facts?

And it gets even worse. From Canadian Physicians for Life:

MAiD has been deemed an essential service in Canada. Currently, palliative care is not an essential service. Palliative Care needs to be deemed an essential service under the Canada Health Act. This would ensure all Canadians have access to compassionate end of life care that allows them to both live and die with dignity.

MAID is deemed an essential service. Palliative care is not deemed an essential service. But I can tell you that even though we have no statistics on palliative care in Canada we do have statistics of how many people we have killed. Health Canada publishes those statistics. In fact, the Minister of Health The Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos, said he was:

"proud to present this Third Annual Report on Medical Assistance in Dying in Canada (2021)"

He's proud to present statistics on how many people Canada killed. Let that sink in.