Posted on 08/30/2019 4:17:31 AM PDT by DoodleBob
In October 2014, Ezekiel Emanuel published an essay in the Atlantic called “Why I Hope to Die at 75.” Because Emanuel is a medical doctor and chair of the University of Pennsylvania’s department of medical ethics and health policy, as well as a chief architect of Obamacare, the article stirred enormous controversy.
Emanuel vowed to refuse not only heroic medical interventions once he turned 75, but also antibiotics and vaccinations. His argument: older Americans live too long in a diminished state, raising the question of, as he put it, “whether our consumption is worth our contribution.”
Emanuel was born into a combative clan. One brother, Rahm, recently completed two terms as the controversial mayor of Chicago; another brother, Ari, is a high-profile Hollywood agent. But even given his DNA, Emanuel’s death wish was a provocative argument from a medical ethicist and health-care expert.
Emanuel, now 62, talked with me about the social implications of longevity research and why he isn’t a fan of extending life spans. I was particularly curious to get his reaction to several promising new anti-aging drugs.
(Excerpt) Read more at technologyreview.com ...
I suppose the Chronically Ill and those in Intractable Pain are his targets? Besides the Unborn?
One of the most well read Pain Management Authors of 70+ papers https://www.acsh.org/profile/richard-red-lawhern
I just turned 71 despite ill health I want to Live, even if it means I’ll live in Pain the rest of my life. Why the H do you think I research every blooming drug those so called medical doctors think I should take? I reversed OP to Osteopenia in 6 yrs with just Bone Vitamins and Minerals, 3 spots are stubborn and remain at OP levels. Women in my family live well into their late 80’s and 90’s. I’ve cousins older than me who have survived heart attacks and breast cancer.
I want to live to see David Keene go to Death Row for Raping and Drowning 8 yr old Ashley Nichole Read, my best friend’s child.
Why would anyone want someone like this for a personal doctor! One day HE might decide you have lived long enough and “do a number” on you.
You are o.k. as long as he gets paid for treating you. When the insurance stops paying him, then you are in trouble.
For a man of 62, he doesn't look all that healthy to me.
I am wary of these MD’s who are “medical ethicists” at medical schools. I got treated for pneumonia by one who is a dean at University of Texas School of Medicine who published peer review papers on such a topic. Same crap.
He’s 62 let’s see what he has to say when he’s 74...
A number of of my direct ancestors lived into their late 90s and a few broke into the 100s...g-g father was still leading a mule on a several hundred mile trap line well into his 90s because he liked to do it...not because he needed too.
Hell, I’ll almost certainly be retiree before my youngest finishes high school
People are nuts
BIL lived to 91 might have made 92 if he’d not had a A Typical Femur Fracture and died on the OR Table. My dad 97, both men were active until the last year of their lives. BIL ran horses and grew hay for them. Active in his community. Took 2 months to plan his Life’s Memorial so many came to it they had to rent out the VFW Banquet hall. Hubby is 79, still does most household repairs, some car repairs, trouble shoots our computers, teaches Math for Ham Radio Extra Classes. And we watch our soon to be 2 yr old Red Headed grand daughter when ever it’s needed.
The arrogance is simply breathtaking, isn’t it?
I work6 with people who are on Medicare. I’ve met people who are “old” at 65 and people who are still “young” over 80 and 90. Having a “meaningful life” should not be determined by whether or not someone does what someone else defines as “meaningful work.”
I met a delightful lady who is over the “useful” age as defined by this guy. She babysits her great-granddaughter. She doesn’t simply park the kid in front of the TV while she does other things; she puts everything else aside and plays with the child. She (and her husband) actively support their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren not financially but emotionally and spiritually. Who is to say that their lives are not “meaningful?”
I’ve also met a lady in her 89’s who has outlived a much younger husband. Her life has diminished considerably and she has some dementia going on. What she spends her time doing is sitting and praying for people. I for one would never say that her life is not “meaningful.”
I had one grandparent living when I was born, and she died when I was 5. None of my grandparents lived to 74. I wish I had known them. I wish they had lived longer lives. Their lives would certainly have been meaningful to me!
Ethicist, what a joke.
He’s 62 and looks 10 years older. He says he’s not going to commit suicide at 75 but will merely stop taking medications. Well, heck, he’d still be using up the earth’s valuable resources and continuing his carbon footprint and to think of all that CO2 he’d be exhaling. Yada, yada, he’s just another “Do as I say but not as I do” whiner.
Guessing his parents are deceased. Uh, huh, was there any question about their cause of death?
Beto thinks people are of no value the day before they’re born. These sickos seem to live their lives but want everyone else to die.
He’s of the generation that heard The Who lyrics “I hope I die before I get old.” And for that generation youth is very important. If you judge your life by that standard you live for sex, drugs and rock and roll — in other words, your a hedonist addicted to the pleasure of the body and once those pleasures are gone with age... well.
I am very, very happy - and currently building a radio-controlled 6-foot Type VIIC U-Boat model to patrol the lake behind my house with my kids.
Life is wonderful!
For atheists who claim you don’t need God to have morals, they don’t seem to big on morals.
This guy is a very sick dog, rabid with his revolting outlook. May he Exit as soon as possible before he is in a position to harm one more person.
We are moving, fast, to the place of families having to decide whether 6 months, a year, 6 weeks, a very small gamble on remission are worth bankrupting your family.
Most boomers will say yes because they grew up in a world where anything else was unfathomable. Going forward, most families will be forced to say no.
Simply because our frame of reference is different. Very different. We never had that experience. Millennials and Zoomers--you may as well be speaking in an other language.
...except that The Who are still touring and Townshend has basically said the lyric was more about wanting to die before the mindset of the old sets in. Frankly, you can draw a line from My Generation to Won't Get Fooled Again to Tea and Theatre to get a secular yet wonderful exposition on life.
If I was cynical, I'd say that Zeke put forward his theory as a way of garnering broad-based support for it. However, the end-game will have a qualifier that smart and "needed" people like him should of course be spared.
diminished state?
like Hillary?
or Zeke’s brain.. and intellect.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.