I'm only young but after reading this article and these depressing comments I feel as though I should pop myself now so I don't have to undergo the trauma of growing old and dying a horrible death later in life.

Seriously though, we humans are not prepared to deal with the other end of our lives. While we are young, death is kept away from us and we are encouraged to see it as an unreality, something that happens to others. This, when combined with religion which fraudulently promises an afterlife and living forever, leaves us unprepared and thinking we will live forever.

Then, eventually, we hit the wall and our body starts to lose its youth and the mirror tells us the awful truth.

I guess proper education is the answer. If we are taught what happens as we age we might be more careful with the time we have before it happens.

And if euthanasia is legalized, death might not be so fear-filled.

Brian Holden is up to his old tricks again.

Unfortunately many OLOers are seeing only half of his equation.
The first half says: If you are old and incapacitated, your plight should not be prolonged – which clearly appeals to many—and,was crafted to!
However, the second half says: If you are a poor third-worlder and have kids you cannot support, you are owed a subsidy.

If fact,he simply wants the money that would normally be used to support old westerners redirected to support third world kids et la.
(though, I suspect,even if such moneys were so redirected – this would not sate Holdens charitable inclinations –for it certainly would not
solve the third worlds growing problems –he’d need to add billions more “tax payer” funds to it)

It’s a variation of the I-will-tell-you-how-to-divide-up-the-cake, pitch.

Holden argues that it’s immoral that “public money” should maintain old western bodies.
Their failing faculties are natures way of saying it’s time to kick on.
If Holden really thinks that way –if he really believes that, and is not just using it as stuffing for his pitch.
He should – to be consistent – also be arguing that the deformed child is natures failure and should not be assisted

And he might do well to remember that his sob story setting,Mumbai, India,is far from the worst of the worst .
Indian has a bigger middle class than Australia
And many well run hospitals and universities.
And India produces many doctors , lots and lots of doctors.
Some of whom, people on Holden’s side of the political spectrum have fought hard to keep in Australia(surely immoral?)

Our old have built what wealth we have,they deserve to enjoy it in their declining years,to the max.

Mr. Holden,

You have posted three dozens articles on OLO in the course of three years and spurned one thousand seven hundred and seventy five people to comment.

What can one read in this huge reaction to your scripts?

When you come across a subject of interest and you feel the urge to cast your opinion on it, do you make any effort to pause and consider the value of your thoughts or you just run for the pen without care for what may perplex your readers?

In societies saner than ours, death is the natural occurrence in the economy of living.

Imagine a family with a grandparent sharing one of the two bedrooms in their unit with their child and imagine that the country they live in is poor and both parents have to go out to work.

Everything fits until the grandparent comes to needing help, then, unbalance sets in.

It is very early spring. At the end of the family’s picnic in majestic country surroundings, the family prepares to return home, kiss the old parent who sits on a chair and depart.

Next day they collect the body.

‘An idyllic farewell in a Croatian village’ of days gone that leaves us with the sensation that our society has regressed into barbarism.

1/1/2011 StephenLMeyer get's dementure.

2/1/2011 StephenLMeyer commits suicide

3/1/2011 A cure is found for Dementure.

Agree Horus.

There is all this talk about how the infirm should have a right to choose a painless death, yet the article is about the resources we devote to keeping the elderly and infirm alive. Presumably the author would have us all feel very guilty about the care given to elderly Australians by contrasting it with the absence of care for poor children in India. I cannot know what every elderly Australian thinks, but I doubt that each lives a miserable existence, is being kept alive by any means possible, and yearns for a quick and painless death.

All the author has emphasised to me is the substantial resources Australia has to care for her citizens compared with countries like India. It doesn't mean that Australians are more compassionate than Indians, rather that Australians have the means to express their compassion.

I was angered at the author's suggestion that it was a good thing that the man in the queue didn't know how much was spent keeping elderly Australians in a vegetative state. Presumably the author thinks the man would think it obscene and see it as a reason to hate Australians? But couldn't he also see his plight as a consequence of a large and growing population long in excess of the ability to provide the infrastructure for a high living standard? Might he not think that with a stable or reducing population, poor Indians might enjoy a much higher standard of living in the future?

Australians have climbed the hill of prosperity and should be proud to enjoy the view. People like the author would have us look at the poor sods further down and urge us to jump, but I think we should be showing them how they can climb up.

US HEALTH CARE PLAN.

Opponents of ObamaCare say it will involve RATIONING of health care.

Dr Donald Berwick, appointed by Obama to run Medicaid and Medicare
says:

“The decision is not whether or not we will ration care,” Berwick told Biotechnology Healthcare, “the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open.”

"You cap your health care budget, and you make the political and economic choices you need to make to keep affordability within reach," Berwick told the Brits. "You plan the supply; you aim a bit low; you prefer slightly too little of a technology or a service to too much; then you search for care bottlenecks and try to relieve them."

"Political"...and "Economic" choices ? scary stuff.

We report....you decide.