June 9, 2025

Dear Friends:

I have very sad news. Stephen Mendelsohn, a disability leader, long-time opponent of assisted suicide, and member of the EPC-USA board, died on June 1 in an accident. Stephen followed the US state bills and updated leaders on news stories. He will be missed.

In late May, I had a speaking tour in British Columbia (BC) where I had engagements in Vernon, Kelowna, Salmon Arm, and Vancouver over four days. In Vancouver, I visited St. Paul’s Hospital to see the euthanasia clinic that was imposed on the hospital by the BC Ministry of Health. The euthanasia clinic was opened in January 2025.

Background: In June 2023, the euthanasia lobby was pressuring the BC government to force Catholic hospitals (Providence Health Care) to provide euthanasia. They used the story of Samantha O’Neill (34) who requested euthanasia at St. Paul’s. The hospital did not provide euthanasia; they transferred O’Neill to St. John Hospice (operated by Vancouver Coastal Health) and she died by euthanasia on April 4, 2023. In December 2023, based on the pressure from the euthanasia lobby, the BC government expropriated property from Providence Health (at St. Paul’s) to build a killing center.

In May 2024, I went to speak at a conference in Germany. While I was there, I visited three of the T-4 euthanasia memorials. In October 1939, the German government expropriated the Grafeneck castle from the Lutheran Samaritan Foundation and changed it into the first centralized T-4 killing center. Grafeneck began killing people in January 1940. About 10,654 people, primarily those with disabilities, were killed there. Is history repeating itself?

Last month the EPC blog at www.epcblog.org surpassed ten million pageviews. In May, the blog had the third highest number of pageviews in its history. I regularly receive emails from researchers thanking us for the blog, especially since it has become historically significant. It has been effectively updated and maintained since 2007.

Canada’s new Liberal government has not indicated whether it plans to institute euthanasia for mental illness alone on March 17, 2027, as approved by the previous Liberal government. We are also concerned that the federal government will approve both euthanasia by advance request and child euthanasia.

Euthanasia Prevention Coalition (EPC) has launched a campaign calling on the federal and provincial governments to do a complete review of Canada’s euthanasia law, a review that was supposed to be done in 2020 but has never been done. [You can read the petition letter at this link.] If the government agrees to review the law, it will enable Canadians with stories of abuses and questionable euthanasia deaths to speak out. Participate in our campaign by signing the online petition, mailing a printed card to your Member of Parliament or by signing a paper petition. You can request postcards and paper petitions from the EPC office by emailing info@epcc.ca or calling 1-877-439-3348. 

[…read more]

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director