Medical assisted dying (MAID) was the most frequent way to commit suicide in 2018, according to Government of Canada reports. (Updated, Saturday 14 March).

In 2018, more people committed suicide through MAID than who hung themselves. (The total MAID deaths for Canada would be even higher if Quebec would have been included in the national statistics).

And no, despite StatsCan’s misleading way of presenting suicide statistics, hanging — not shooting — is the most frequently chosen method to commit “intentional self harm” in Canada. Medical assisted dying remains the most frequent method of committing suicide.

Shooting is the fourth most often chosen method.

According to Statistics Canada statistics for 2018, “Intentional self harm,”  hanging is by far the most frequent (53%), followed by poisoning (18%), and then shooting (14%). This pattern has been repeated annually for at least two decades. Stats Canada does not report the high rates of hanging suicides possibly because hanging is endemic among depressed Aboriginal Canadians, particularly younger Aboriginals. This is a crisis being swept under the rug by Ottawa.

Thanks to Dennis Young I was motivated to update my statistics on “intentional self harm,” the traditionally reported suicide methods.

Including the 2,614 MAID deaths in 2018 along with the 3,809 deaths due to “intentional self harm” gives a total of 6,423 suicide deaths in 2018, not 3,809, as reported by Statistics Canada. Thus, hanging is the second most frequent (32%), followed by poisoning (11%), then shooting (8%), and all other suicide methods (9%).

StatsCan does not consider Medical assisted deaths as “suicide”

Interestingly, MAID deaths are not included in Statistics Canada’s suicide reports. Only the underlying cause of death is included in StatsCan’s Cause of Death reports. The fact that an MD or nurse injected poison into a patient — and basically killed them — is not mentioned. For MAID stats one has to go to occasional reports by Health Canada. Is this being deliberately covered up?

Statistics Canada makes a careful distinction between “intentional self harm” — usually called “suicide” and Medical assisted dying (MAID).

Thanks are also due to RangeBob who alerted me to the statistical reports about the increasing numbers of people who chose to die through the newly legalized MAID (medical assist in dying).

A note about RangeBob who prefers to remain anonymous. He only communicates with me using his CanadianGunNutz pseudonym, RangeBob. Despite this, he has provided me with leads to key documents over the past few years that are almost always quickly verified. If you want to see more of his insightful posts, sign up to Canadian Gun Nutz.

(I made a few changes on 14 March thanks to errors discovered by RangeBob.)