At what point does 'medical science' become an end in itself, with no regard for the practical outcome for the patient? I'm delighted to hear that certain surgical procedures were life-prolonging, but sometimes I do wonder if medical science hasn't fallen too much in love with itself and not enough in love with the humanity behind its ethos. I'm wondering this, because two meetings ago at Plumpton, there was a fund-raising drive for a baby girl who'd had meningococcal septicaemia. Because this very serious illness, in trying to save the body's vital organs, shuts down peripheral blood supplies, the toddler's feet and hands were starved of circulation. The result: she is now a quadruple amputee. Her arms were severed below their elbows, her legs above her knees. Her life is 'saved' by medical science.
Years ago, the baby would have died, everyone would have grieved, of course, but now the parents have an entirely dependent child who will gradually grow into a highly-dependent adult. Will she find love, happiness, a guy who'll see past the metal hooks and the need to strap his wife into them every day, and who'll put up with the need to take her to get them changed frequently, as amputees have to? Will she really thank medical science for saving her life when she goes to school, and has to put up with what will inevitably be, from some quarters, some cruelties on top of the ones she's suffered?
Medical science often reduces older people's lives to no more than that of a circulating pump. It can keep people 'alive', but not living a life.
There is a lot to thank medical science for. There are many aspects of it, though, that as it strives continually to deny us the natural processes of life, the artificial result it produces is actually counter-productive to the essence of its enjoyment, since being alive is so much more than just breathing.
