7 ms·

Toronto woman applies for euthanasia after nearly a 10 year search for housing

41 points by thinkingemote 4y ago

rozab 4y ago
Multiple Chemical Sensitivity appears to be a psychogenic illness. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_chemical_sensitivity https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_chemical_sensitivit... This is not to say the symptoms are not real and debilitating, but it would be difficult to provide housing which is suitable if the symptoms are not actually correlated with specific chemicals in the environment.
- CryptoBanker 4y ago
  That was my first thought on reading the article. This woman suffers from mental illness, but it’s not depression at the root.
betaby 4y ago
Canada is just very-very expensive place to live.
newaccount2021 4y ago
sinuhe69 4y ago
Is it possible to find a sustainable house for her or not? If yes, the government can give her an aid to rent the place and the issue solved!
- nisegami 4y ago
  MAiD is cheaper for the government and there's no real incentive to spend the extra money on keeping people around.
thedrbrian 4y ago
fucking hell. so much for the kind helpful image of Canada. There's another person considering MAiD here https://toronto.citynews.ca/2022/11/16/ontario-medically-assisted-death-support/ https://toronto.citynews.ca/2022/11/16/ontario-medically-ass... He got a happy ending[so far] as he got enough money from a go fund me to keep him going for the next few years.
- joenot443 4y ago
  After watching some interviews with this gentleman, I’m relatively sure this is the outcome he and his lawyer were hoping for.
- mozman 4y ago
  Canada has become a hell hole, they’ve lost their minds. Trudeau is evil.
lrvick 4y ago
It seems the majority of the medical community sees MCS as a psychiatric condition with real self-generated symptoms. Choosing death over living in a place because it had some dead cockroaches and not enough windows? This does not seem like a choice a mentally healthy person could make. MAiD should be delayed, IMO, until multiple mental health professionals weigh in.
- mgamache 4y ago
  I tend to agree. Would be interested to hear what her family thinks.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- OctopusLupid 4y ago
  This comment is irking me for some reason. It sounds very unsympathetic to her situation.
  - feet 4y ago
    Yes, the peasants must be happy living in their boxes with roaches and no sunlight
    - lrvick 4y ago
      I lived in a car for years and upgraded to an abandoned rotting trailer with no running water. I know what poor is like, and it is still no reason to end your life. Took me 10 years to build marketable skills but I eventually became a bay area home owner. Can everyone do that? Probably not. You can still win from a bad starting hand in life if you are simply more stubborn than everyone else. Also dead cockroaches is still better conditions than a lot of people in third world countries get.
      - feet 4y ago
frankjr 4y ago
If you cannot find affordable housing in Toronto, one of the most (if not the most) expensive cities in the world real estate wise, why not just move elsewhere? Surely the country side would be cheaper and have more fresh air.
- kotaKat 4y ago
  Because there is no "just" move. Ontario Disability Support is only $1,228 a month. The "shelter allowance" out of that is a whole $522 towards housing. Province-wide. Disabled people don't have equitable access to transportation, let alone a roof under their head. Moving isn't the answer. People on CERB (that is - the Canada Emergency Response Benefit) received CA$2000 a month as a baseline during the pandemic. ODSP recipients didn't receive any additional benefits. We need to raise the amount of money that disabled Canadians receive monthly. Nobody can live on what is essentially just a smidge over $900 US a month anywhere in Canada.
- mgamache 4y ago
  She may need access to medical care? Rural healthcare is really bad.
  - sanjayio 4y ago
    Pretty sure Calgary, Edmonton, Fredericton, and all many more major cities in Canada have decent access to healthcare from rural areas with a car. Trying to live in Toronto has been a losing battle for a long time. The wait for health care even with appointments has been a losing battle in Toronto for quite some time.
    - eladyarom 4y ago
      I live in NB and access to healthcare in New Brunswick (Fredericton included) is not better than in Toronto, far from it. In rural areas it's even worse, and we're constantly seeing hospital shutdowns due to lack of staffing. We (and NS as well) have had a massive influx of people from Ontario since the start of covid and the explosion of real estate pricing, but we don't have the infrastructure to support it.
llimos 4y ago
It looks like this article was prescient: "Why is Canada euthanising the poor?" https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/why-is-canada-euthanising-the-poor-/ https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/why-is-canada-euthanisin... Discussed previously on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32922399 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32922399
LoveMortuus 4y ago
I was going to write a comment about how I'm against euthanasia but after reading the article I'm not sure... I still believe that suicide should never be the option and people that are considering it should really seek professional psychological help. But I'm just a hypocrite, because I tried to kill myself many times and after seeking professional help, I didn't really feel like they did anything except helped some time pass, which probably helped a bit... I am here writing a comment~ The fact is that if euthanasia was an option for me, I would be dead. But because it wasn't, I just spent some time in the psychiatric ward. Now my goal in life is financial freedom which should keep me busy for a decade or two, especially since I come from zero! (I'm ~3.75% done!) I'm not a medical professional, actually am not a professional of any kind, so if you're suffering seek proper help, don't let your demons win!
- aussieshibe 4y ago
  I feel like you missed some qualification here: > I still believe that suicide should never be the option From the rest of your comment, it sounds like you were facing some form of severe but ultimately temporary problem. People considering suicide are not necessarily in this same boat, and circumstances make all the difference. To believe that suicide should "never" be the option suggests that you're only considering a subset of people who are in a similar situation to the one you faced. There are plenty of situations which give a reasonable expectation of permeance, or cause such severe suffering that while possibly temporary may not be worth enduring. To me it comes down to the freedom to choose, for people of sound mind making a rational decision. I'm young, healthy, and generally happy, but there are absolutely situations which may affect me in the future over which I would prefer death, and I firmly believe I should have the freedom to make that choice if the time ever comes.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
  > I still believe that suicide should never be the option and people that are considering it should really seek professional psychological help. It is weird to me that our society is so fixated on autonomy, self-sufficiency, bootstrapping, competition, and exploitation right up until someone has the desire to exit the whole thing. At that point they get just enough interest from others to keep them alive so they can continue feeding the sick system.
aaron695 4y ago

41 points by thinkingemote 4y ago

Multiple Chemical Sensitivity appears to be a psychogenic illness. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_chemical_sensitivity https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_chemical_sensitivit... This is not to say the symptoms are not real and debilitating, but it would be difficult to provide housing which is suitable if the symptoms are not actually correlated with specific chemicals in the environment.

CryptoBanker 4y ago
That was my first thought on reading the article. This woman suffers from mental illness, but it’s not depression at the root.

betaby 4y ago

Canada is just very-very expensive place to live.

newaccount2021 4y ago

sinuhe69 4y ago

Is it possible to find a sustainable house for her or not? If yes, the government can give her an aid to rent the place and the issue solved!

nisegami 4y ago
MAiD is cheaper for the government and there's no real incentive to spend the extra money on keeping people around.

thedrbrian 4y ago

fucking hell. so much for the kind helpful image of Canada. There's another person considering MAiD here https://toronto.citynews.ca/2022/11/16/ontario-medically-assisted-death-support/ https://toronto.citynews.ca/2022/11/16/ontario-medically-ass... He got a happy ending[so far] as he got enough money from a go fund me to keep him going for the next few years.

joenot443 4y ago
After watching some interviews with this gentleman, I’m relatively sure this is the outcome he and his lawyer were hoping for.
mozman 4y ago
Canada has become a hell hole, they’ve lost their minds. Trudeau is evil.

lrvick 4y ago

It seems the majority of the medical community sees MCS as a psychiatric condition with real self-generated symptoms. Choosing death over living in a place because it had some dead cockroaches and not enough windows? This does not seem like a choice a mentally healthy person could make. MAiD should be delayed, IMO, until multiple mental health professionals weigh in.

mgamache 4y ago
I tend to agree. Would be interested to hear what her family thinks.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
OctopusLupid 4y ago
This comment is irking me for some reason. It sounds very unsympathetic to her situation.
- feet 4y ago
  Yes, the peasants must be happy living in their boxes with roaches and no sunlight
  - lrvick 4y ago
    I lived in a car for years and upgraded to an abandoned rotting trailer with no running water. I know what poor is like, and it is still no reason to end your life. Took me 10 years to build marketable skills but I eventually became a bay area home owner. Can everyone do that? Probably not. You can still win from a bad starting hand in life if you are simply more stubborn than everyone else. Also dead cockroaches is still better conditions than a lot of people in third world countries get.
    - feet 4y ago

frankjr 4y ago

If you cannot find affordable housing in Toronto, one of the most (if not the most) expensive cities in the world real estate wise, why not just move elsewhere? Surely the country side would be cheaper and have more fresh air.

kotaKat 4y ago
Because there is no "just" move. Ontario Disability Support is only $1,228 a month. The "shelter allowance" out of that is a whole $522 towards housing. Province-wide. Disabled people don't have equitable access to transportation, let alone a roof under their head. Moving isn't the answer. People on CERB (that is - the Canada Emergency Response Benefit) received CA$2000 a month as a baseline during the pandemic. ODSP recipients didn't receive any additional benefits. We need to raise the amount of money that disabled Canadians receive monthly. Nobody can live on what is essentially just a smidge over $900 US a month anywhere in Canada.
mgamache 4y ago
She may need access to medical care? Rural healthcare is really bad.
- sanjayio 4y ago
  Pretty sure Calgary, Edmonton, Fredericton, and all many more major cities in Canada have decent access to healthcare from rural areas with a car. Trying to live in Toronto has been a losing battle for a long time. The wait for health care even with appointments has been a losing battle in Toronto for quite some time.
  - eladyarom 4y ago
    I live in NB and access to healthcare in New Brunswick (Fredericton included) is not better than in Toronto, far from it. In rural areas it's even worse, and we're constantly seeing hospital shutdowns due to lack of staffing. We (and NS as well) have had a massive influx of people from Ontario since the start of covid and the explosion of real estate pricing, but we don't have the infrastructure to support it.

llimos 4y ago

It looks like this article was prescient: "Why is Canada euthanising the poor?" https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/why-is-canada-euthanising-the-poor-/ https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/why-is-canada-euthanisin... Discussed previously on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32922399 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32922399

LoveMortuus 4y ago

I was going to write a comment about how I'm against euthanasia but after reading the article I'm not sure... I still believe that suicide should never be the option and people that are considering it should really seek professional psychological help. But I'm just a hypocrite, because I tried to kill myself many times and after seeking professional help, I didn't really feel like they did anything except helped some time pass, which probably helped a bit... I am here writing a comment~ The fact is that if euthanasia was an option for me, I would be dead. But because it wasn't, I just spent some time in the psychiatric ward. Now my goal in life is financial freedom which should keep me busy for a decade or two, especially since I come from zero! (I'm ~3.75% done!) I'm not a medical professional, actually am not a professional of any kind, so if you're suffering seek proper help, don't let your demons win!

aussieshibe 4y ago
I feel like you missed some qualification here: > I still believe that suicide should never be the option From the rest of your comment, it sounds like you were facing some form of severe but ultimately temporary problem. People considering suicide are not necessarily in this same boat, and circumstances make all the difference. To believe that suicide should "never" be the option suggests that you're only considering a subset of people who are in a similar situation to the one you faced. There are plenty of situations which give a reasonable expectation of permeance, or cause such severe suffering that while possibly temporary may not be worth enduring. To me it comes down to the freedom to choose, for people of sound mind making a rational decision. I'm young, healthy, and generally happy, but there are absolutely situations which may affect me in the future over which I would prefer death, and I firmly believe I should have the freedom to make that choice if the time ever comes.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
> I still believe that suicide should never be the option and people that are considering it should really seek professional psychological help. It is weird to me that our society is so fixated on autonomy, self-sufficiency, bootstrapping, competition, and exploitation right up until someone has the desire to exit the whole thing. At that point they get just enough interest from others to keep them alive so they can continue feeding the sick system.

aaron695 4y ago