Saturday, April 15, 2006

Things They Should Invent: comprehensive comparison of all the ways of dying

I want someone to make a website with the pros and cons of every possible way of dying - how painful they are, how long they take, how long they cramp your style for, how undignified they are - so that the general public can make an informed decision of whether they want to reduce the risk of a particular illness or accident.

This idea came about when I realized that the vast majority of health advice out there has the ultimate aim of reducing the risk of heart disease (i.e. you should exercise, you should reduce salt, fat and cholesterol, you should watch your weight, etc.), but I don't actually know anything about how bad heart disease is. I'd imagine a heart attack involves pain, but then what? Either you have some pain and you die, or you live, and...what? If you've survived a heart attack, are you still able to live normally? Can you go back home? Can you go to the bathroom by yourself? Google tells me that there are certain medications or lifestyle restrictions, but are those just to stop you from having another heart attack, or are they for something else? It seems to me that a heart attack is not the worst possible way of dying - Alzheimer's or MS would certainly be worse, and cancer might be worse but I don't have enough information to know for sure. If I had a family history of Alzheimer's, maybe I wouldn't want to reduce my risk of heart disease, so I could die of a heart attack at 60 in a quick burst of pain rather than literally lose my mind at 80.

But there are lots more ways of dying, most of which I know very little about. That's why I want someone to put all this information together in one place - so people can make informed decisions. It seems a bit over-optimistic for everyone in the world to forego life's pleasures to achieve the goal of dying in their sleep at age 100. That will certainly work for some people, but we can't reasonably expect it to be applicable to everyone. The rest of the world should have the information they need to make an informed decision, if they choose, so they don't have to give up their favourite foods or activities or whatnot to prevent a less-unpleasant death, only to die a more-unpleasant death later.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

heh...

Anonymous said...

Try "How We Die," by Sherwin B. Nuland. It describes some of the most common ways of dying (cancer, heart disease, etc) and is written by a doctor.