Stats reveal who is choosing medically-assisted dying in Ontario

The youngest person to have chosen a medically assisted death in Ontario last year was 27.

The oldest was 101.

A year after doctor-assisted death became legal in Canada, statistics revealed to CBC News by Ontario's chief coroner paint a broad picture of who has chosen to die with their doctor's help in the last 12 months.

The numbers are being released amid controversy about equity of access to medically-assisted death.

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In June, 2016, Parliament passed a bill which lays out the rules that allow doctors and nurse practitioners to legally end the lives of terminally ill who are suffering and whose deaths are 'reasonably foreseeable.'

The numbers from the Ontario coroner's office reveal that 548 people have died with medical assistance as of June 30, 2017.

In all but one case, the medication to help the patient die was administered by a physician. In one case, the patient administered it themselves.

Of those 548 people, 259 were women and 289 were men.

The average age of those who died was 73, the numbers show.

Here's what else the Ontario statistics reveal:

Underlying conditions:

360 - Cancer-related

40 - ALS

44 - Other neurological disorders

63 - Cardiovascular/respiratory

41 - Other

Where people died:

303 - in hospital

195 - at a private residence

33 - in a long-term-care facility or nursing home

17 - at a retirement home or seniors residence