Ismaili Centre Conversation Series, Life and Death and Belonging

Dr Naheed Dosani, a palliative care and family physician at William Osler Health System and the Inner City Health Associates, discussed “Life and Death and Belonging” - how bioethics fits into our laws and practices, and what it means in our world today and beyond. In 2018 Dosani was awarded the Governor General of Canada's Meritorious Service Cross for his work as the founder of PEACH (Palliative Education And Care for the Homeless), a mobile, street and shelter-based outreach service aimed at meeting the palliative care needs of the homeless and vulnerably housed.  “Being homeless is in effect a life sentence,” Dosani said. Homeless people have an average life expectancy of 34 - 47 years, as compared to the average Canadian life expectancy of 77 – 82 years.

Dosani uncovered this issue after a life-altering experience at a downtown Toronto shelter during his residency at the University of Toronto. “This personal and traumatic experience showed me that even if you are dying in this country if you are living in poverty, have a mental illness, or suffer from housing insecurity, there are severe obstacles and barriers to accessing the care you need,” said Dosani. This experience led him to found PEACH and to become an advocate for palliative care for the homeless. In front of a highly engaged audience, Sajoo and Dosani discussed contemporary topics in bioethics such as the ethics and responsibility to vaccinate, the ethical obligation of organ donation, and the importance of planning for the end stages of life and death. Dosani contrasted palliative care with Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID). “Palliative care in Latin means to ‘cloak or comfort, to put a blanket on’ when someone is suffering. It is not a place, it is an approach that can be provided in homes or hospitals,” he explained. Sajoo grounded this contemporary discussion in the history of bio-ethics in Islam by sharing the story of the great Syrian physician Ibn-al-Nafis.

Dr Amyn Sajoo is Scholar-in-Residence at Simon Fraser University – where he lectures in human rights, global politics and religion. His current research focuses on the ethics of citizenship and public religion.  Since 2018, Dr Sajoo has been curating this Ismaili Centre Conversation Series in Vancouver and Toronto— featuring John Ralston Saul, Benjamin Berger, and Abdallah Daar in Toronto. The series began in Vancouver with the University of British Columbia’s Dean Catherine Dauvergne and Dr Akber Mithani, on the topic of Migration, Identity and Anxiety. A lively question and answer period with the audience concluded the event.