When Support Fails: The Deepening Crisis Behind Track 2 of MAiD for People with Disabilities

Every Canadian deserves the opportunity to live a full, dignified life—regardless of ability. But today, a disturbing reality is emerging across the country: some people with disabilities are choosing Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) not because they are dying, but because they cannot get the support they need to live.

Track 2 of Canada’s MAiD legislation allows individuals who are not nearing the end of life to request assisted death. As of July 2024, Inclusion Canada reports that people with disabilities are the only group eligible for MAiD based solely on disability, without any requirement of terminal illness. This is not a choice made in freedom. It is a symptom of a system that has failed to provide accessible and affordable housing, appropriate care, and basic income supports.

A Legislative Shift Without Safeguards

On October 6, 2020, the Canadian Government reintroduced Bill C-7, removing the requirement that a person’s natural death be reasonably foreseeable to qualify for MAiD. This shift opened the door to Track 2 and widened access to assisted death in ways that disability advocates warn are dangerously lacking in safeguards. The Vulnerable Persons Standard (VPS), created in 2016, laid out clear, evidence-based protections meant to ensure people are not driven to MAiD by systemic neglect. Yet these recommendations remain inadequately applied.

Reported cases suggest that suffering leading to MAiD requests is often rooted not in a person’s medical condition, but in the systemic barriers they face: poverty, inaccessible housing, lack of care, and social exclusion. In the words of the VPS advisory group, “It is systemically caused suffering that is at the root. And for this, people’s lives are being terminated through the MAiD system.”

A Human Rights Concern

The Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC) has raised alarm about the application of MAiD in the absence of sufficient supports. As the CHRC puts it: “Accessing MAiD should not result from the existence of systemic inequality, nor should it be a default for a State’s failure to fulfill its human rights obligations.” When people are choosing death because living with a disability is made unbearably difficult by policy failures, this is not autonomy—it is abandonment.

In March 2025, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities released its review of Canada’s disability rights record. The Committee expressed serious concern over the expansion of MAiD to people with disabilities who are not near end-of-life, stating that this violates Canada’s obligations under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). The UN called on Canada to repeal provisions allowing MAiD solely on the basis of disability and instead invest in life-sustaining supports such as housing, health care, and income security.

Legal Challenge in Progress

Momentum for change is growing. In September 2024, the Disability Rights Coalition launched a constitutional challenge in Ontario against Canada’s MAiD law. The case argues that allowing assisted death for people with disabilities outside the context of end-of-life care discriminates against disabled people and violates their Charter rights. Inclusion Canada, a key partner in the challenge, has emphasized that the law sends a dangerous message: that the lives of people with disabilities are less worth living—and less worth protecting.

Local Impacts: What We’re Seeing in Calgary

At Accessible Housing, we work with individuals every day who struggle to find accessible, affordable housing that meets their needs. Without access to appropriate supports, people with disabilities are at greater risk of poverty, housing instability, and social isolation. The consequences are devastating.

In our own programs, we have seen this crisis up close where individuals both referred to us and in our Bridge to Home program have pursued MAiD.

In all these cases, the primary reason cited has been the inability to secure necessary supports—especially appropriate housing.

Meanwhile, government decisions continue to chip away at the support systems that once offered hope: the clawback to AISH (Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped) due to the Canada Disability Benefit, the elimination of self-advocacy programs in Alberta, and the normalization of MAiD as an “option” for people whose only struggle is with poverty and a lack of access.

We Must Do Better

We cannot let MAiD become a policy substitute for care, housing, and inclusion. The solution to systemic suffering is not death. It is investment in life.

We echo the call of Inclusion Canada, the United Nations, and others: Provide assisted life before assisted death.

It is time to re-centre our laws, our systems, and our policies around dignity and equity. People with disabilities must not be left with the impossible choice between a life without support and a death that seems, to some, like the only escape.

Canada must build a future where people with disabilities are supported to live—not pushed toward dying because support is out of reach.

If you or someone you know is struggling, please reach out to a support organization. You are not alone. Your life matters.

Source Links and Further Reading:

• The Vulnerable Persons Standard (VPS)
• Canadian Human Rights Commission Submission
• UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Statement
• Do Better – Inclusion Canada on the UN Report
• Disability Rights Coalition Challenges MAiD Law in Ontario Court
• Assisted Life Before Assisted Death – Dr. Tim Stainton
• MAiD to Die by Medical and Systemic Ableism
• An Inaccessible Life but Endorsed Death
• Living with Disabilities in the Age of MAiD – The Big Story