Assisted suicide now accounts for nearly one in 20 deaths in Canada, newly-released government data indicate, a shocking number that some observers say should serve as a warning to American states and the United Kingdom as they consider the practice.

Canada’s deaths from assisted suicide now number more than 60,000 since it was legalized in 2016. A record-high 15,343 people died in Canada by assisted suicide in 2023, making up 4.7 percent of deaths in the country. An additional 4,000 patients requested medical aid in dying but did not receive it, as some were deemed ineligible, others withdrew requests, and some died before they could receive it.

The new data, released by Health Canada in its annual report, indicate that assisted suicide deaths increased by nearly 16 percent in 2023 compared to the prior year.

Canada’s death count comes as assisted suicide has recently been fiercely debated in America at the state level as a slew of states have recently considered the practice — and as nine states and Washington, D.C. have already legalized it. British lawmakers recently backed a bill to allow assisted suicide for terminally ill adults with decision-making capacity and a life expectancy of six months or less. 

Canada, meanwhile, has much more liberal assisted suicide laws, allowing adults with decision-making capacity to commit assisted suicide if they are diagnosed with a “grievous and irremediable medical condition.”

That condition is defined as a “serious and incurable illness, disease or disability,” with an irreversible decline in capability, and “experiencing enduring physical or psychological suffering that is caused by their illness, disease or disability” that is “intolerable to them.” 

That language has prompted backlash from disability rights groups who argue it discriminates against disabled people and could pressure vulnerable groups.

And the new data appears to back them up: Large percentages of assisted suicide patients are reporting that their sources of suffering — a condition required for eligibility — includes isolation, loneliness, and feeling like a burden.

The report notes that 96 of assisted suicide deaths were “reasonably foreseeable,” which it labels as “Track 1,” while 4 percent of patients’ deaths were not reasonably foreseeable, which it defines as “Track 2.”

“Isolation or loneliness” was reported as a symptom of suffering by 21 percent of patients in Track 1 and 47 percent in Track 2. “Perceived burden on family, friends, or caregivers” was reported as a source of suffering by 45 percent of those in Track 1 and 49 percent in Track 2.

“What we see is that this is actually really about a social condition rather than a physical condition,” the executive director of the Canada-based Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, Alex Schadenberg, tells the Sun in an interview. 

Backers of assisted suicide promise that it will only be allowed “for a few reasons and that it won’t get out of control,” he says, “but the problem is, it will.” 

Once it’s legal, he adds, the debate shifts from whether it’s okay to kill another human being to “who does the killing and for what reasons.”

“This is what we see now in Canada, where the numbers have been going crazy,” he says. “But it’s not only the number of deaths. It’s the types of euthanasia deaths, and the reasons for it, that have also expanded vastly.”

Canada’s health minister, Mark Holland, said he was “pleased” to present the data and said it will help contribute to a “national conversation” about medical aid in dying. 

The Canadian government is committed, he said, to ensuring that the legal framework for the practice “reflects the needs of Canadians, protects those who may be vulnerable, and supports autonomy and freedom of choice.”