2 ms·

What is health care if not life extension?

• TeMPOraL 9y ago
  Life preservation against non-aging-related causes, reduction of suffering, improving quality of life. As it is, healthcare isn't really directly concerned with extending human lifespan beyond the expected figures.
  • mikeash 9y ago
    A huge amount of health care is preserving life in the face of aging. There are a ton of diseases that come from aging, and many treatments for them. This whole thing seems to be about drawing a nonsensical line between “disease” and “aging” and either ignoring the former as a cause of death, or deciding that it has enough effort behind it already. If someone has a cancer that’s going to kill them in six months, and it’s cured with a medical treatment, how is that not extending their lifespan? What would lifespan extension look like, if not a slow, broad development of myriad treatments to treat or cure the many things which kill us?