What price life?

New Scientist ^ | Tuesday, October 17, 2006

[orionblamblam]

Charlotte Wyatt, who has serious brain, lung and kidney damage, weighed only 1 pound and measured just 5 inches when she was born three months prematurely on October 14, 2003. The child hit the headlines soon after birth as her parents battled in the courts to force doctors – against their medical judgement – to provide artificial ventilation if her condition worsened.

Her parents won the year-long legal dispute, which cost the taxpayer an estimated £500,000 ($929,000). In addition, the girl’s medical treatment costs around £300 a day, and has totalled an estimated £1.1 million so far.

... Charlotte’s parents have separated and both say they cannot care for her and want foster parents to look after her. Both parents live on state benefits and have been described by hospital sources as infrequent visitors to the hospital that their daughter has never left.

[orionblamblam]

Interesting quandry. How much should the taxpayers pay to keep someone alive?

[Petronski]

How much money would it take for you to let her die?

[gridlock]

If the taxpayers are going to take over the cost of medical care, they have to pay what it takes. Maybe nationalizing the health care system wasn't such a bright idea, after all!

[orionblamblam]

How much money are you willing to expend? That 300 pounds/day has to be paid by *somebody.* Would you pony it up?

As for how much money would it take for me to let her die... Hel's Belles, son, I let thousands of people die every day without costing me a dime. So do you. "People die" is a basic a fact of life. There is no injustice in someone keeling over from a disease. (Murder, of course, is a different matter.)

[D.P.Roberts]

Isn't it wonderful how people are always willing to pay for their principles with other people's money?

[Petronski]

No, I mean, if the decision was yours, how much would you have to be paid to let her die?

[orionblamblam]

> they have to pay what it takes.

That's the4 question, though. One major source fo the rising cost of healthcare is that medical science allows people to live today who would have died yesterday... but that requires neato new expensive technology.

Consider this hypothetical: ten years from new, the tech is available to revive to verifiable life someone who has been shot in the head with a twelve guage. They'll be drolling, screaming morons, but alive nonetheless. Price tag: fifty million to turn 'em back on, and a grand a day for life support.

What to do?

[the invisib1e hand]

How much money would it take for you to let her die?

Well said.

[orionblamblam]

> if the decision was yours, how much would you have to be paid to let her die?

Insufficient data to answer your question. In this hypothetical, is she my daughter? Is the taxpayer getting soaked? In that case, likely you'd have to pay me a *lot*. Because it would cost me nothing to maintain my daughter.

If I was just some disinterested judge of some kind? I'd want to know more about her condition. Is she actually in there? Is there consciousness? Intelligence? Does she really, honestly have a chance for life, or is she just goign to remain a small organic nugget in a very large hunk of medical technology?

[Petronski]

For some people, that price is pretty damn low.

[TheBattman]

As a sideshow to this story - the "parents" who claimed to have such an interest in the child's survival now both basically disclaim the child - wanting the system to take the child in.

Motives are a funny thing. I wonder if the parents expected a financial windfall from the whole thing (like maybe people would donate tons of money)?

[orionblamblam]

Question: how much of my money would you spend to keep her alive?

[Lesforlife]

Another mainstream media hit piece on Charlotte's parents who have
fought for her right to life.

Check out: http://charlottewyatt.blogspot.com

[From many - one.]

I think many of the "right-to-life" folks also would eliminate any government spending thus translating into no problem for the incredibly rich, and no life for the average folk.

If there were no NHS in England the baby would not have survived this long.

[sgtbono2002]

***Both parents live on state benefits****


Pay for the child--cut off the parents.

[IMissPresidentReagan]

Here's my two cents. Let me start off by saying I'm not sure how much a taxpayer should pay. As a conservative I hate to spend money on anything, but how do you put a price limit on life? It is an interesting quandary to say the least.

I'd been following this story since a year ago and I admittedly know very little about the situation. However, from what I do know or thought I knew, there seems to be some inconsistencies between what I thought I had learned and what this article reports. I first learned of this situation when the British doctors/hospital had stated that they would not resuscitate baby Charlotte again, despite her parents' wanting her to be resuscitated. The parents took the case to the courts and lost, and from what I had understood the parents were trying to bring her home so that they could care for her and contrary to the statements of this article, the parents seemed pretty involved in Charlotte's life, though the television program I watched was no champion of baby Charlotte as constant comparisons were made to the Terri Schiavo case, and conclusions drawn about quality of life, as well as commenting on the strain on the parent's marriage. It was my understanding that from the program and the small bits and pieces I read after watching the program that the father had lost his job because of the situation (he missed a lot of work to be at the hospital and such) and that is where their financial troubles began. I believe it was an episode of 48 hours or Primetime that first sparked my interest. After the court case, it seemed that this situation had died down in the media.

Now it seems that the parents are being painted in a much less caring light. I seem somewhat confused about their motivations if they are infrequent visitors, and I had thought they had moved her from a hospital to a facility of some sort to "rehabilitate" her so she could come home.

I guess none of this is important, it just made me wonder what was really going on.

[Old Professer]

As much as it takes, either play with your toys or quit collecting them.

[IMissPresidentReagan]

I was curious if that may play a role in how the parents were being portrayed, as this article cast quite a different light on them than other pieces I had seen and read previously.

[Old Professer]

Buy more shotguns?

[the invisib1e hand]

Question: how much of my money would you spend to keep her alive

obfuscation-of-the-year candidate.