Bill C-14, The Medical Assistance in Dying Act

Jule Koch | May 18, 2016

Last Friday, May 13, the pharmaceutical company Pfizer announced that it is blocking the use of their drugs in lethal injections for executions.

The procedures for lethal injection in “assisted” suicides and mercy killings are the same as for executions. The drugs kill the person by first putting them to sleep, and then stopping the breathing and the heart, in that order.

Lethal injections can leave a person gasping for hours before they die, which happened in Arizona in 2014 to convicted murderer Joseph Wood, who took two hours to die instead of the expected 10 minutes. This was despite 15 injections of the deadly drugs given in desperate attempts by officials to shorten the time. One injection was supposed to suffice.

Links to gruesome details of Wood’s death were included in major news stories announcing Pfizer’s decision.

Pfizer stated that they offer these drugs “because they save or improve lives, and markets them solely for use as indicated in the product labeling”.

Is killing patients one of the uses on the product labelling? Will Pfizer block the use of their drugs in “assisted” suicides and mercy killing?

Will Canadian doctors eventually have to resort to the black market to get the drugs to kill their patients by lethal injection?