TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2024//
TI  - Physicians, public discourse, and passive euthanasia of infants with down syndrome in the late-twentieth century
JO  - Canadian journal of health history
A1  - Walls, Martha
SP  - 100
EP  - 128
VL  - 41
IS  - 1
N2  - Through the late-twentieth century, physicians endorsed the denial of life-saving surgeries to infants because they had Down syndrome. Grim physician assessments of the inevitable burden of Down syndrome found ideological footing in the 1970s crusade to eradicate the condition, a public health goal made possible by new genetic diagnostics and a weakened abortion law. What is most striking about this physician-sanctioned passive euthanasia is that it persisted even in an era of unprecedented expansion of disability rights. Physician endorsement of the euthanasia of infants with Down syndrome offers a powerful corrective to the notion that post-war Canada was marked by waning support for eugenics. Medically sanctioned euthanasia of babies because of their Down syndrome, eugenics of the most extreme type, thrived in late-twentieth century Canada.<p />  <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 2816-6469
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.3138/cjhh.670-092023
ID  - ref1
ER  -