Dying young and old

1. Cultural warrior Ben Shapiro got into hot water recently by suggesting that death of the elderly from COVID19 isn't equivalent to the death of  30-something from COVID19. Shapirio is not a bioethicist, so his assessment is intuitive. There are lots of critics who wish to indulge in moral grandstanding and lobe accusations of hypocrisy rather than have a serious ethical discussion. 

2. One issue is whether it's more tragic to die young or have a natural lifespan. For instance, Mickey Mantle died shortly after a liver transplant. The question was whether the donor liver was wasted on a poor candidate. Should that have gone to a patient in a better prospect of survival? 

Dick Cheney's heart transplant at 71 was criticized. Should that go to someone with more life ahead of him? 

Not life threatening, but criticisms were raised about Prince Philip receiving a hip replacement at 96. 

3. Returning to (2), there's a sense in which the elderly have both more to lose and less to lose. On the one hand they have a cumulative lifetime of memories. A lifetime of experience.

On the other hand, the young miss out on their future. They never had those experiences. 

4. There's also the issue of squandering the gift of life. Blowing opportunities. Can you forfeit the right to demand a second chance when your second chance denies someone else a first chance? Someone who through no fault of their own never had the opportunity you abused?

5. Then there's the question of a normal lifespan. Surgery, medication, and good diet can extend life beyond what would be a natural lifespan. Is that an entitlement or a windfall? Is that something we should get used to? Should we feel cheated if we don't have a normal lifespan? Or is that a boom?

6. Artificially prolonging life carries the risk of increasing exposure to raving diseases like Parkinson's and senile dementia. So there are tradeoffs. It's tempting fate. 

7. From what I've read, the death toll for COVIN-19 is inflated by classifying the cause of death as COVIN-19 even when comorbidities were necessary contributors to death. It was the coronvirus in combination with preexisting or underlying conditions that pushed them over the edge.

8. From what I've read, we have the opposite of quarantine measures for the elderly. Rather, we round them up in retirement ohms and nursing homes which are infection vectors. They die at high rates because they infect each other and have low resistance. So if this was really about protecting the elderly, they wouldn't be concentrated in nursing homes and retirement homes where the density of exposure and low resistance guarantees high fatalities 

9. Death is inevitable. We can sometimes postpone the inevitable, but the ultimate issue is the significance of human life. Is this life all there is? What ultimately matters is not how long you live but what's in store for you when you die. 

10. Theologically, it's an interesting question what constitutes a normal or natural lifespan. As I read Genesis, humans were naturally mortal, naturally subject to the aging process, but they were created with the unrealized capacity for immortality. They'd naturally age and died, perhaps at a slower rate, but the potential for immortality wasn't automatic. Rather, that's a gift conferred by the tree of life. And for the dead in Christ, that's reversed by the resurrection of the just.