OTTAWA, Feb. 13 (Xinhua) -- Medically assisted deaths in Canada rose by 35 percent in 2021 to more than 10,000, Statistics Canada said on Monday.

Releasing data on medical assistance in dying (MAID) requests and cases, the national statistical agency said the number of medically assisted deaths in Canada has continued to grow since MAID was introduced in 2016.

There were 12,689 written requests for MAID in 2021, 31.3 percent more than the 9,664 written requests in 2020. This resulted in 10,029 medically assisted deaths in 2021, an increase of 34.7 percent from the 7,446 deaths in 2020, the agency said.

According to the agency, MAID accounted for 3.3 percent of all deaths in Canada in 2021, up from 2.4 percent of all reported deaths in the previous year. In 2021, slightly more than half of those receiving MAID were men.

The rise in medically assisted deaths may partly be explained by a greater awareness of MAID as an end-of-life option in Canada. This increase has led to more demand for medical practitioners, physicians or nurse practitioners, who provide MAID. There were 1,577 MAID practitioners in 2021, compared with 1,345 in 2020, Statistics Canada said.

In early February, Canada delayed the assisted dying for persons suffering solely from mental illness for one year to allow more time to ensure MAID assessors and providers are ready to assess requests for MAID for persons suffering solely from a mental illness in a safe and consistent manner across Canada.