He links the rise of euthanasia to an intellectual shift that took place in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, away from the moral precepts of the Judeo-Christian tradition.
"[5] The Canadian Historical Association awarded Dowbiggin the Wallace K. Ferguson Prize for A Merciful End, stating that the book "gives a clear and evenly-balanced study of the history of euthanasia in the United States since the latter part of the nineteenth century", and concluded that it overall is a "masterful explanation of the way in which changing social, economic and disease-related factors have affected public interest in euthanasia.
"[6] Dowbiggin has spoken against euthanasia legislation and said that the Netherlands exists as a "cautionary lesson" for Canada in particular, showing that those places that "take a permissive attitude to assisted suicide keep pushing the boundaries.
[8] Ulf Högberg, guest researcher of Public Health and Clinical Medicine at Umeå University, argued in the European Journal of Public Health that, "The book is most impressive, finely tuning the history between choice and compulsion of sterilization policy; sometimes it has been a fine line in between, sometimes an abyss of abuse of human rights.
"[9] A review in The New England Journal of Medicine, by Carolyn Westhoff, an official of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, summed up by agreeing with the book's conclusion that "advocacy of sterilization as a solution to population growth leads to serious problems when that agenda overrides individual values and individual autonomy", but differed from it in stating that "Voluntary sterilization, however, deserves its great popularity and will remain valuable as one part of a broader menu of options for family planning.