Family blasts Canada for euthanizing son who suffered from ‘seasonal depression’

A family has accused Canada’s laws of ‘k!lling the disabled and vulnerable’ after their son, who suffered from seasonal depression, d!ed by assisted su!cide. Kiano Vafaeian, a 26-year-old blind man with Type 1 diabetes, d!ed in December using Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) program, which allows patients with ‘grievous and irremediable’ medical conditions to request a lethal drug. Eligibility was expanded in 2021 to include people with chronic illnesses, disabilities, and, pending parliamentary review, potentially individuals with certain mental health conditions. Vafaeian faced mental health struggles stemming from a car accident at 17, and according to his mother, his depression often flared during the winter months. For years, the family had successfully prevented their son from using the program. Last year, however, Dr Ellen Wiebe, a MAID provider in British Columbia, approved Vafaeian’s death – news the family only learned about days later. Vafaeian’s mother, Margaret Marsilla of Ontario, alleged that Wiebe was ‘coaching’ her son on how to qualify as a Track 2 patient – those whose natural deaths aren’t deemed ‘reasonably imminent,’ according to Fox News Digital. ‘We believe that she was coaching him on how to deteriorate his body and what she can possibly approve him for and what she can get away with approving him for,’ Marsilla told the outlet. Marsilla has since been battling fiercely to undo the Track 2 modification and to support Bill C-218, a legislative effort intended to restrict MAID for those whose only condition is a mental illness. At 17, a severe car accident derailed Vafaeian’s college plans, and he spent years moving between family members’ homes, his mother said. It all came to a head in 2022: after losing vision in one eye, he became ‘obsessed’ with the assisted-suicide program. ‘He kept on emphasizing about how he could get approved,’ Marsilla told the outlet. ‘We never thought there would be a chance that any doctor would approve a 22- or 23-year-old at that time for MAID because of diabetes or blindness.’ That year, Vafaeian attempted to die under the program for the first time after being approved, even going so far as to schedule a time, date and location for the procedure in Toronto. But the plan unraveled when his mother accidentally discovered the appointment email and called the doctor, posing as a woman inquiring about MAID. She also took to social media to publicly voice her opposition. She taped the conversation with the doctor and sent it to a reporter. The doctor then postponed the procedure over the outcry and decided not to go through with it. Marsilla said her son was initially angry, insisting she had ‘violated’ his right to choose death, but she told Fox that he began improving quickly the next year and even moved back in with the family in 2024. ‘He tried his best when he was in one of those good highs of life,’ she told the outlet. ‘Then winter, fall started coming around, he started changing and then everything that we had worked for from spring and summertime just disappeared he would start talking about MAID again.’ Nevertheless, Marsilla said her relationship with her son had been improving, and in September she moved him into a fully furnished Toronto condo with a live-in caregiver. Vafaeian texted his mother that he was ‘looking forward to a new chapter,’ explaining that he was trying to save money so they could travel together. By October, he’d joined a gym and completed 30 personal training sessions. Soon, however, he walked away from it all, with his mother saying that ‘something snapped in his head.’ Vafaeian checked into a luxury Mexican resort on December 15, posting photos with staff. Two nights later, he flew to Vancouver – and three days after that, he texted his mother that his physician-assisted suicide was scheduled for the next day. Vafaeian’s death certificate now lists the ‘antecedent causes’ of his assisted suicide as blindness, severe peripheral neuropathy – nerve damage outside the brain and spinal cord that causes pain and numbness – and diabetes.The post Family blasts Canada for euthanizing son who suffered from ‘seasonal depression’ appeared first on Linda Ikeji Blog.