ArticleJournal of medical ethics2021
Social determinants of health and slippery slopes in assisted dying debates: lessons from Canada.
Article in Journal of medical ethics, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
16 citing papers in PubMed.
- Capable, Unbearably Suffering, and Excluded: People With Mental Illness and the Ethics of Canada's Assisted-Dying Regime.Bioethics · 2026Article
- Assisted Dying in Unjust Conditions.Journal of bioethical inquiry · 2026Article
- Review
- Life, death, and 280 characters: a hashtag analysis of #AssistedSuicide on X (2015-2025).Frontiers in digital health · 2026Article
- The euthanasia law from the perspective of healthcare professionals in Spain.BMC medical ethics · 2025Article
- MAiD: How Slippery is its Slope?HEC forum : an interdisciplinary journal on hospitals' ethical and legal issues · 2025Article
- The first year of assisted dying in New Zealand through the lens of healthcare professionals not directly involved in the process.BMC palliative care · 2025Article
- Canada's Medical Assistance in Dying System can Enable Healthcare Serial Killing.HEC forum : an interdisciplinary journal on hospitals' ethical and legal issues · 2025Article
- Developing robust systems for Track 2 MAID in Canada: A qualitative study.Palliative care and social practice · 2025Article
- Medical assistance in dying for people living with mental disorders: a qualitative thematic review.BMC medical ethics · 2023Review
- Ethical Diversity and Practical Uncertainty: A Qualitative Interview Study of Clinicians' Experiences in the Implementation Period Prior to Voluntary Assisted Dying Becoming Available in their Hospital in Victoria, Australia.Journal of bioethical inquiry · 2023Article
- Japan should initiate the discussion on voluntary assisted dying legislation now.BMC medical ethics · 2023Article
- Practitioners' experiences with 2021 amendments to Canada's medical assistance in dying law: a qualitative analysis.Palliative care and social practice · 2023Article
- Health care providers' ethical perspectives on waiver of final consent for Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD): a qualitative study.BMC medical ethics · 2022Article
- Resource Limitation and "Forced Irremediability" in Physician-Assisted Deaths for Nonterminal Mental and Physical Conditions: A Survey of the US Public.Journal of the Academy of Consultation-Liaison PsychiatryArticle
- Perception of Physicians Working in Chile Toward Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia: A Nationwide Cross-Sectional Study.Journal of primary care & community healthArticle
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The question of whether problems with the social determinants of health that might impact decision-making justify denying eligibility for assisted dying has recently come to the fore in debates about the legalisation of assisted dying. For example, it was central to critiques of the 2021 amendments made to Canada's assisted dying law. The question of whether changes to a country's assisted dying legislation lead to descents down slippery slopes has also come to the fore-as it does any time a jurisdiction changes its laws. We explore these two questions through the lens of Canada's experience both to inform Canada's ongoing discussions and because other countries will confront the same questions if they contemplate changing their assisted dying law. Canada's Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) law has evolved through a journey from the courts to Parliament, back to the courts, and then back to Parliament. Along this journey the eligibility criteria, the procedural safeguards, and the monitoring regime have changed. In this article, we focus on the eligibility criteria. First, we explain the evolution of the law and what the eligibility criteria were at the various stops along the way. We then explore the ethical justifications for Canada's new criteria by looking at two elements of the often-corrosive debate. First, we ask whether problems with the social determinants of health that might impact decision-making justify denying eligibility for assisted dying of decisionally capable people with mental illnesses and people with disabilities as their sole underlying medical conditions. Second, we ask whether Canada's journey supports slippery slope arguments against permitting assisted dying.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.