Last night I watched the BBC documentary based at Addenbrokes Hospital in Cambridge that followed the stories of three people with horrendous brain injuries following road accidents. In an age of high-tech medicine and the ability to 'interrupt' or 'reverrse' death three real families faced the unthinkable... would a loved one live or die; should a loved one live or die; could a loved one live or die. One, as it happens the youngest, died, the other two survived with varying degrees of major disability.
The programme raises lots of questions and offered few answers.
As I watched and marvelled at the skill and care of the medical professionals, I couldn't help wondering what it all cost, not because I didn't think these people deserved a chance, but because the NHS is so stretched financially. It's the old chestnut question of utilitarian ethics: what is the greatest good for the greatest number? Is it better to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds (I am guessing) on one person or a few hundred on lots of people?
As I watched and marvelled at the skill and care of the medical professionals, I couldn't help thinking that when the NHS began no one could have conceived of such complex intervention as is now routine. I wondered how much a publicly funded health service has actually allowed skills to develop that might not have done otherwise? So many 'routine' treatments and procedures have emerged in the last half century. Even a few years ago all of these people would have died on the day of their accident.
As I watched and marvelled at the skill and care of the medical professionals, I couldn't help wondering how those involved balance what is best for the patient and what furthers their research interests. It must be tempting when a really interesting case comes along to get excited about that and so forget that this is a real person with real relatives.
As I watched and marvelled at the skill and care of the medical professionals, I couldn't help noting what a contrary society we now are, where some people demand the 'right to die' and other people cling fiercely to life despite all odds. A society where, whatever area of life and health you consider there are conflicting 'rights'...
As I watched and marvelled at the skill and care of the medical professionals, I couldn't help pondering the idea of 'playing God,' as one person in the programme observed, and how we are happy (bad word but can't find a better one) to do so when it suits our desires.
As I watched and marvelled at the skill and care of the medical professionals, I couldn't help wondering what difference faith makes in all of this. Not so much in which decision is made, but how. Not so much in the outcome, but how people face it. Not so much in the immediate, but on the long term
The documentary ended with some delightful footage of one of the three sitting in a chair surrounded by his family, eyes shining and a hint of a smile on his face; it had begun with the same family saying their goodbyes as they prepraed to withdraw life support. Before the accident this man had evidently said he would not wish to live like this, now he seemed able to appreciate the life he had. It would be easy to draw naive and glib conclusions, and no doubt some will. One online commentater said 'there was no miracle.' No? I guess it depends what you need a miracle to be.
It was a programme that made me think - probably not the best thing to be doing late at night - and for that I am glad.