X-Message-Number: 5597
Date: 14 Jan 96 21:31:21 EST
From: Mike Darwin <>
Subject: Perry, Emergency alerts, etc.

Steve Bridge speculates in his post that Perry Metzger attacked Alcor over 
the handling of the Rob Michels case in another forum.  This isn't so, 
although due to the screwed up order of the posts, I can understand why 
this happened.  Maybe the following will give some order to this discussion 
and exhonerate Perry (or anyone on CCF) from suspucions:

1) My initial post was for Cryonet, and the remarks about "better things to 
do with your time" and "digital masturbation" were aimed at recent Cryonet 
posters, not at CC posters.  The CFF is a business like forum with topics 
being remarkably well focused and remarkably free of blathering or long 
"philosophical" discussions.  In part this is due to the structure of the 
forum which is dedicating to dealing with CryoCare business and issues, and 
thus is by its nature more focused (yes, I've seen the same people blather 
on Cryonet, including moi, so I'm not claiming moral or intellectual 
superiority here). Again, my apologies to Perry and any others confused or 
wrongly blamed!

2) To the best of my knowledge, NO ONE on CCF or in CryoCare has had 
anything critical to say about the Michels case or Alcor's handling of it.  
In fact, as far as I know it has not been discussed at all.

3) Perry has said NOTHING about this case to me personally or publically, 
and certainly nothing on CCF, or anything critical.

4) My remarks about criticizing Alcor were aimed at those poster to CRYONET 
who questioned this or that about the way things were handled.  AND to 
several members of Alcor and another cryonics organization (not CC) who 
wrote nasty notes to me or which were forwarded to me, about Alcor's 
failure to act to immediately exhume Mr. Michels and sue everybody in 
sight.  I thought these remarks were inappropriate, or to be more prosaic, 
*plain stupid.*  I don't have enough information to know about Mr. Michels 
wishes.  If it were me, I'd say don't bother with the exhumation and a good 
stern but supportive talk with the police and coroner or ME would be what 
was  in order.  If, of course, it were Saul Kent lying there, and he were 
signed up with Alcor, I would expect backhoes and lawyers working in-tandem 
'round the clock till WHATEVER was left was tucked away in LN2.  But this 
is not Saul Kent we're talking about here.

5) More to the point, whether it is Saul (with his "extreme ;)" views on 
conditions for his cryopreservation, *everyone* would, I think, agree, and 
I *know* be better served, by *avoiding the problem in the first place.*  
That was the purpose of my initial post, which Steve presumably saw for the 
first time when he saw my (hopefully) clarifying responses.

6) While my opening salvo was aimed at Cryonet, it was cross posted to CCF. 
 Forums are light years faster than Digests and thus a great deal of 
discussion occurred in real-time cyberspace before my FIRST post ever 
reached its intended target: Cryonet.

7) Steve says others are interested in working on this problem.  Well, so 
am I.  And, as anyone who knows me knows, my interest is not new.  If I can 
fault anyone for the Michels situation it is ALL the cryonics groups who 
could have done something about this.  I have harped on this issue for 
years, and years ago Reg Thatcher actually did some work with Jerry Leaf on 
an EKG type system.  I was the first to get a member at increased risk of 
SCD to get an adapted apnea monitor which he still wears I believe, to this 
day.  This is Joe Cannon, an Alcor member who has made his use of this 
device public knowledge.

8) Everybody isn't as compliant as Joe, or as determined.  And Joe is 
unprotected against SCD during the day.  So, that still leaves a big hole.  
Further, as the Michels tragedy should teach us, even young people 
sometimes die suddenly and for unexplained reasons.  Indeed, at the lab I 
have an entire text book sitting on my shelf dealing with the etiology of 
SCD in people *without* any atherosclerosis.  Happens all the time.  You 
hear about it in high profile cases with young athelets (high school and 
college) several times a year.  It has happened to TWO young cryonics 
patients in the last decade, both of whom suffered (probably) terminally 
from it; Michels being one of them.  This is 2 people in a sample size of 
say 500 worldwide?  Weird, but there it is.

9) Half of all first heart attacks are the last heart attacks because you 
die.  About 20-30% of existing cryonicists (based on published demographics 
of some years ago) will have a heart attack.  These cryonicists, agains 
based on published numbers, are at MUCH ELEVATED risk of dying alone and 
remaining undiscovered.  Consider the most statistically common cryonicist 
profile:

*single
*male
*something of a loner
*lives alone
* likely ineffective intervention to prevent SCD based on supplement and 
dietary comments on surveys.

Add in my personal experience with cryonicists:

*all of the above.
*excessive optimism about chances for personal survival.
*sedentary lifestyles (academics, professionals, computer people, office 
workers, etc).
*excessive belief in the efficacy of the particular life extension regeime 
they are on.
*10-20% over ideal body weight.
*Typical 30-40% fat US diet with much of it saturated fat.
*Elevated serum cholesterols and resistant to taking prescription 
medication or doing dietary modification to change it.
*independant; will NOT stay off ladders or do other things to reduce risk 
of accident at home as they age; will continue to ride motorcycles, will 
buy home exercise equipment without careful check-up, etc.

Any of you recognize yourselves out there?

Another point is that people with ANY terminal disease, but especially 
cancer and heart disease are at high risk for sudden death.  In cancer 
cases some of this is due to bleeds, respiratory decompensation, and so on. 
 But some cancer patients just die suddenly of SCD, often without 
atherosclerosis.  In a survery of 10,000 such cardiac arrests in hospital 
not one was successfully resuscitated.  It is thought that cytokines 
present in advanced cancer such as tumor necrosis factor (TNF) may be a 
contributing factor in such cases of SCD and the zero chance of successful 
resuscitation.

Thus, it is my informed guess that as the current crop of cryonicists age 
they will be at much higher risk of unattended SCD than the general 
population.  And, it goes without saying, those that sign-up already ill or 
dying are at astronomically higher risk.
 
9) I would be interested to see a simple report from EVERY cryonics group 
listing the number of unattended deaths their members  *and* their patients 
have experienced, if nothing else, as a percentage of their total patient 
population.  Furthe, I would request that all groups list the number of 
near misses they have experienced; i.e., members who were almost down but 
were found while dying or nearly dead.  I will be happy to save Alcor time 
and trouble going over old records with patients transferred to them or 
done during my tenure by private e-mail if they so wish.

I emphasize there is no blame to place here.  This is an unaddressed 
problem by all groups.  It is a level playing field, now.  The "blame" will 
start from here on out, or to put a more positive light on it, the 
statistics will show who does best at implementing a workable and cost 
effective program of SCD detection.

10) I remain very interested in marketing such a system and shepherding it 
through commercial development.  I see no reason why profits (if any :))))) 
cannot be equitably shared.  Certainly development costs would be more 
supportable if we knew up front that the largest groups would get behind 
implementing or pushing such a system with their members, and making such 
systems strongly encouraged and easily available to their highest risk 
members.

I have a very sophisticated laboratory at my disposal geared to device 
development and testing.  I have access to one of the best medical device 
design and minaturization engineers in the United States.   I have implant 
testig capability.  I have access to skilled MDs in Mexico and elsewhere 
out of country for legal implantation of devices that would be illegal to 
implant here.

Mike Darwin, President
BioPreservation


Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5597