Healthcare as the Ultimate Turn-Off
Franz Kafka is one of those authors whose body of work is quite prophetic. In the context of our modern world, it’s rather diagnostic, since the bureaucratic colossus that turns the wheels of our society can’t always tell gems from germs. This especially applies to healthcare like the British NHS that’s currently in the headlines due to the death of Indi Gregory, the eight-month old baby suffering from mitochondrial disease. She was taken off life support at the Nottingham hospital where she was treated for her condition, after her doctors concluded they could no longer do anything to improve it. Instead of dying at home, the little girl died in the arms of her mother at a medical facility like any other hopeless case. But she was more than a “case”. Admittedly, that’s exactly what she is to outsiders and the media who are now having a field day and an another excuse to roast the NHS for its shortcomings which resurfaced back into the spotlight.
The other day I went to our local hospital for a dental treatment I didn’t have to pay for due to my medical insurance. Here I should emphasize the fact I’m a freelancer without a regular income yet my healthcare, including dental, is financed by the state. We can whine about the screwed-up economy and nationalism that permeates all the pores of our politics, but this basic healthcare works good because it’s treated exactly like its name implies: something basic. We shouldn’t have to bleed oceans of money in order to fix what’s wrong with our bodies.
This is not the case in countries like USA and the countless tales about American dreams all drown in the puddle of bankrupt reality that’s not incurable, yet a trap that’s very difficult to get out of. It requires ambition, mud-crawling, ruthlessness and cruelty, if necessary. When you finally climb up to the level where you can afford good healthcare, you might be so fucked up that you’ll actually need it. If you end up with a life-threatening diagnosis triggered by all that stress, the tip of the ladder into the American dream might lead you into a hospice instead.
Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni offered to help by granting her citizenship for an urgent treatment in Italy but Mr Justice Peel decided to cut that straw of hope for the baby by saying “there is nothing to suggest that Indi Gregory’s prognosis would be beneficially altered by the Italian hospital’s treatment.” In spite of her parents repeatedly pleading for Indi to be treated abroad, nothing could make the authorities change their mind. How insane do you have to be to decide to act against explicit wishes of parents? Is there any legal consequence for this? I hope so.
We’re not talking here about idiots who treat serious conditions with herbs instead of medication. We’re talking about people who entrusted the life of their daughter to professionals to do their job and cut the crap of having Indi in their thoughts. Even on life support, she didn’t deserve quite literally a turn-off in this kind of way. The hospital Bambino Gesu in Rome was willing to take a chance and treat the baby, ultimately to no avail. While I can’t talk about this from a father’s perspective, I know how it feels to have a close family member fighting with an incurable degenerative disease where the most you can do is to hold their hand through it.
Trust me, it’s not pretty, watching them stripped of their independence all the way back to a toddler-like position. That’s where the most resistant human spirit goes to die before the body takes its last breath. While Indi’s prospects were indeed a one-way street, going about this in such a cold way, washing their hands of their own responsibility is disrespectful at best and morally inacceptable at worst. Even if you were in the middle of Gaza strip right now, you’d know they need more than just efficient medication.
I can comprehend dealing with so many patients in various stages of terminal diseases provides you with emotionally thicker skin since you’d hardly survive in this particular profession without that. Still, that’s not really a problem of those affected by it directly or indirectly. Sometimes you have to make difficult decisions that make the difference between someone’s life and death. That’s when it gets personal and you can no longer hide between a doctor’s stoic attitude without even suggesting a second opinion though that’s exactly what might soothe someone’s fears.
Terminally ill people are vulnerable due to their unwavering belief into whatever can provide them with a glimpse of hope. That’s why you see so many in Christian pilgrimage sites. Once the NHS gives up on you, you’ve got nothing to lose if you put all your eggs into the basket of an imaginary being if it provides you at least with a warm embrace. No surprise that the Italian hospital was called Baby Jesus. That’s also the corner stone of the booming market of alternative medicine. But I’m sure now matter how helpless you feel, you won’t put Goop’s jade egg into your egg basket.
Dean Gregory, the girl’s father, described the whole ordeal as “sickening”. It’s hard to disagree with this assessment. Cards are stacked against people like this from the very start. When they have to rely on a healthcare system that’s notorious for its dysfunctionality and overcomplicated procedeedings, it’s always a gamble. However, he shouldn’t have had to gamble with his own daughter’s life. He was forced into this position against his own will by someone else. No matter their intentions and prognosis, it wasn’t necessarily their call.
I don’t claim knowledge about how her staying on life support would put anything but the spirit of her parents to rest. Maybe it would be appropriate to describe it as “to hold but not to have.” All of us mammals have a soft spot for babies, especially those that suffer. That’s why videos of stray, weak puppies getting saved are so popular after all. Pleas for donations for terminally ill children get shared so much on social media for the same reason. People are either genuinely invested and donate or click “like” to reiterate how good they are for caring in the first place. Guess what morons, Facebook likes don’t help if you need a liver transplant.
The death of Indi Gregory is merely the exposed tip of the mountain called NHS with its barrage of similar absurdities, where they literally put their foot in the door to different solutions for those who urgently need them. Scandinavian approach to public health is often cited as the closest to the optimum. While that’s not necessarily true for everyone in that economy, it’s much better than its equivalents in countries like England or America. The Canadian system is also praised as something USA should be aspiring too. But anything that has the slightest hint of a universally beneficial idea is likely to be deemed as socialism by Republicans and Fox News.
It doesn’t really matter what you think about this issue right now. They pulled the plug on a little girl against her parents’ wishes and it’s unsure if anyone will go one step beyond sympathies. Because those are cheap. Words are cheap. Actions aren’t. Actions require money, infrastructure and personnel. Most of these were available yet the hospital in Nottingham and Judge Peel claimed to know better. It’s too late to change your mind once they turn it off. Which is exactly what happened. The plug is out. Unless someone has to face the music in a courtroom, I’d suggest them to shut up and keep their shitty prayers for themselves. You did enough damage already. And who knows, one day it might be you. What would you do?
