"For 30 years Tom Koch has covered the introduction, acceptance and out of control expansion of MAiD in Canada through a series of journal, newspaper, and magazine articles. Here he combines that work to show how a bottom-up, traditional medical ethic arising within medicine and stable for two Millenia, has been exchanged for a top-down, thinly principled, bureaucratic ethic of care and, he would argue, too often non-care. This ethic focuses only on relief of an individual’s suffering, a goal we all accept, through absolute prioritisation of a right to individual autonomy, including to have medical assistance to end one’s life. It also displays ‘presentism’, looking only to the immediate present and not the past or future to seek wisdom and assess wider and more profound risks and harms of this stance, especially those to vulnerable people, Medicine and society. This book helps us to understand what has happened with MAiD in Canada, which is essential if the damage it is causing there is to be limited. It is also a vital warning to other countries, such as Australia that have expressly adopted the MAiD model, or are considering doing so."

"Seeking Medicine’s Moral Centre is timely and much needed critical appraisal of the moral landscape of contemporary medicine. With erudition and a keen eye for factual accuracy, Tom Koch retraces the ideological and cultural shift that resulted in the emergence of bioethics as the main source of moral authority in health care. Through powerful narratives and insightful analysis, Koch explores how society’s attitudes toward life, death, and disability have changed, often in ways that prioritize efficiency over compassionate care. The adoption of Medical Aid in Dying (MAiD) in Canada, Koch argues, is symptomatic of the failure of bioethics. This new ethic is a top-down imposition of a set of principles on medicine that prioritizes patient autonomy without a careful consideration of the role and knowledge of practitioners. The abandonment of medicine’s patient-centered Hippocratic tradition and vocational ethic on behalf of the complex, pragmatic, principle-driven approach to address ethical conundra in medicine has proven to be detrimental to an ethics of care. A compelling read for anyone interested in reassessing the intellectual bases of bioethics. "