X-Message-Number: 23974 From: "John de Rivaz" <> References: <> Subject: re: Celebrity Signups Date: Sat, 24 Apr 2004 15:15:40 +0100 . Message #23966 > From: > Date: Fri, 23 Apr 2004 10:46:41 EDT > Subject: Steve Bridge points well taken re: Celebrity Signups > a good idea. It just so happens that Francis Crick, for instance, is 87 > years old and has cancer. This makes him uninsurable at ANY rate. Is it not possible in the USA to have an "investment only" insurance, ie the sum insured equals the value of a bond run by the insurance company? The advantage of this is that the investor gets the benefits of the insurance company's trust and the legal and tax benefits of life insurance, and all of the funds are invested rather than providing life cover. It certainly has been available in the UK in the past, although I have no idea about the current situation. With regards to the Omni winner who did not take up his prize of a free cryopreservation, exactly the same thing happened with the competition run by the British magazine New Scientist. Their much publicised competition had a choice of a holiday including a trip to a famous observatory, or membership of CI with the cryopreservation fee paid. It was won by some woman who chose the $13,000 holiday rather than the $28,000 CI full body cryopreservation. In a poll, about 30% of responders said they would have gone for the CI cryopreservation. This can be extrapolated to suggest that if cryopreservation was an option on the UK's state run health service, approximately 18 million people would opt for it. But as it was, cryonics people were a minority and it can be justified that the magazine chose the option that would cost it less money. Had New Scientist (a magazine with a greater standing in the scientific world than Omni) just offered the holiday they would probably have got no publicity at all. But as it was, they got coverage on nearly all the highly watched prestigious TV news and current affairs programmes in the UK and also a high level of coverage all around the world. -- Sincerely, John de Rivaz: http://John.deRivaz.com for websites including Cryonics Europe, Longevity Report, The Venturists, Porthtowan, Alec Harley Reeves - inventor, Arthur Bowker - potter, de Rivaz genealogy, Nomad .. and more Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=23974