First person: Living with disabilities in the age of MAiD

In today’s The Big Story podcast, there is no shortage of opinion out there on Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD), from doctors, advocates and experts, as well as first-person testimonials from terminally ill people who are availing themselves of the system. One of the perspectives often missing, however, is from people with disabilities, some of whom say they feel the system pushes them towards using MAiD by making them feel like a burden on society.

Today, using text-to-speech program, we present one of those opinions, a woman who is leading a charge to preserve some MAiD-free spaces for people with disabilities within the Canadian health-care system.

Gabrielle Peters is the writer of this Policy Options article on ableism and MAiD, a policy analyst and the co-founder of Disability Filibuster. “We know that many believe it is better to be dead than disabled. But we don’t need it said to our face when we are seeking health care,” said Peters.

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