Family Enraged As Disabled Son Dies Under Assisted Suicide Program

A Canadian family has accused the country’s laws of “killing the disabled and vulnerable” after their 26-year-old son, who suffered from seasonal depression, died through the nation’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) program.

Kiano Vafaeian, a blind man living with Type 1 diabetes, passed away in December after being approved for MAID a program that allows patients with “grievous and irremediable” medical conditions to request a lethal dose of medication.

The program’s eligibility was expanded in 2021 to include individuals with chronic illnesses, disabilities, and, pending parliamentary review, those with certain mental health conditions.

Vafaeian’s mother, Margaret Marsilla of Ontario, described her son’s long struggle with mental health issues stemming from a car accident at age 17, which left him with lasting trauma and recurring bouts of depression, particularly during the winter months.

For years, the family successfully prevented him from accessing MAID. However, in 2025, Dr. Ellen Wiebe, a MAID provider in British Columbia, approved Vafaeian’s application news the family learned only days later.

Marsilla alleged that Dr. Wiebe had “coached” her son on how to qualify as a Track 2 patient, a category for those whose natural death is not considered “reasonably imminent.”

“We believe that she was coaching him on how to deteriorate his body and what she could approve him for,” Marsilla told Fox News Digital.

Since then, Marsilla has been advocating for legislative changes, including support for Bill C-218, aimed at restricting MAID for individuals whose only qualifying condition is a mental illness.

Vafaeian’s challenges began at 17, after a severe car accident derailed his college plans. He spent years moving between family homes and struggling with vision loss. By 2022, after losing sight in one eye, he became increasingly focused on MAID.

“He kept emphasizing how he could get approved,” Marsilla said. “We never thought any doctor would approve a 22- or 23-year-old for MAID because of diabetes or blindness.”

That year, Vafaeian scheduled his first assisted-suicide procedure in Toronto, but the plan was halted when his mother discovered the appointment and intervened, even posing as an inquirer to speak with the doctor.

Publicly voicing opposition on social media, Marsilla helped postpone the procedure, and her son began showing signs of improvement in 2024.

“He tried his best during good periods of life,” she said. “Then winter came, and everything we had worked for disappeared… he would start talking about MAID again.”

By September, he had moved into a fully furnished condo in Toronto with a live-in caregiver, joined a gym, and completed personal training sessions, even expressing hopes to travel with his mother.

Tragically, Vafaeian later checked into a luxury resort in Mexico in mid-December, and within days, he traveled to Vancouver to undergo physician-assisted suicide.

His death certificate cites blindness and severe peripheral neuropathy nerve damage outside the brain as antecedent causes leading to his assisted death.

Marsilla has since become a vocal advocate against Track 2 MAID approvals for vulnerable populations, calling for reforms to prevent similar tragedies in the future.