S-248An Act to amend the Criminal Code (medical assistance in dying)

What it does

• Allows a person whose natural death is not reasonably foreseeable to sign a written arrangement for medical assistance in dying on a set day, if they may lose the capacity to consent before that day.
• Allows a person diagnosed with a serious and incurable illness, disease or disability to make a written declaration that waives final consent if they later lose capacity and meet the symptoms named in the declaration.
• Requires that declaration to be made after diagnosis, within five years, and to be witnessed by two independent witnesses and certified by a medical practitioner.
• Keeps medical assistance in dying off the table if the person shows refusal or resistance by words, sounds or gestures, even after an arrangement or declaration.