X-Message-Number: 1548
Date: 06 Jan 93 03:18:20 EST
From: Saul Kent <>
Subject: CRYONICS:  Reply To Thomas Donaldson

I agree that we should be working to "organize Alcor so that it will be
more careful with patients..."

With The Dora Kent case, it looked as if "everything would be okay" for
about 18 hours.

I don't believe Dora Kent would have been transferred to the patient
care organization, which would have reduced the risk to the patients
being cared for by that organization; nor would she have remained at
Alcor.  The Dora Kent case was not declared a "murder" case until about
a month after the coroner lost the preliminary injunction hearing on
Feb. 1, 1988.  After we won a preliminary injunction against the
coroner, the patients were far safer than they were before the hearing,
while the major risk was transferred to the members of the suspension
team.

I believe a separate patient care organization would provide legal
protection for its patients because the primary risk of each new
suspension would be incurred by the organization performing the
suspension, with a lesser degree of risk for the patient care
organization which would not be involved in the suspension. In short,
that those allegedly responsible for any "wrongdoing" would have no
legal connection to those responsible for the patients already in
suspension. 

It's not true that my "main issue" is that "the storage function be
removed from Alcor".  My arguments in favor of a separate patient care
organization are just as applicable if Alcor is the patient care
organization.

Once again, I want to repeat that, in my opinion, the strongest argument
against a separate patient care organization is that it would represent
a significant loss of efficiency: i.e., the cost would be significantly
higher than if Alcor remained an all-purpose cryonics organization.

I also want to point out that, just because I've argued in favor of a
separate patient care organization, doesn't necessarily mean I'm in
favor of it. Or that I favor it at this time.  

Saul Kent

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=1548