X-Message-Number: 6193
Date: Sun, 12 May 96 21:20:41
From: Steve Bridge <>
Subject: SCI.CRYONICS Alcor and CryoCare Standbys
To CryoNet and sci.cryonics
>From Steve Bridge, President
Alcor Life Extension Foundation
May 12, 1996
In reply to: Message #6183
From: (Steven B. Harris)
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
Subject: Re: Timothy Leary Renounces Cryonics
Date: 9 May 1996 07:05:08 GMT
Message-ID: <4ms5f4$>
References: <4mm6s8$>
<>
I found Dr. Steve Harris's discussion on the Leary case to be a
valuable addition in perspective to what was posted by Charles Platt and
Brian Wowk, and I thank him for posting it.
In his comments to David Cosenza, Steve Harris touches briefly on two
subjects that require a bit more explanation. Let's start with standby
services.
> Comment: Leary was not left out in the cold. Again, the only
>thing CryoCare did with Leary was withdraw under great financial
>and social pressure some standby services which Alcor generally
>never offers in the first place. If Cosenza thinks the people at
>CryoCare are ogres for doing this, he should talk to this own
>organization about the obligation to provide standby services.
>He seems to be unusually confused about the issue.
Steve Harris has his own confusion here. Alcor ALWAYS offers standby
services. Sometimes standby is not possible (sudden death) and sometimes
individual members do not have (or do not choose to allot) the financial
resources to pay for a long standby. I will agree that Alcor does not yet
have a cryonics physician as deeply versed in internal medicine, aging,
and modes of death as is Dr. Harris. Therefore, our ability to offer
medical advice on the patient's disease which might allow the patient to
live longer is necessarily less than CryoCare's. CryoCare's ability to
provide *medical and nursing assistance* is of course better in southern
California than is Alcor's, because Mike Darwin lives there and Steve
often visits there. Many people would say this is not even a *duty* of a
cryonic suspension organization; although there are several cryonicists
alive today who are happy that their suspension organization cared enough
to help, when it had the knowledgeable people available to do so.
Alcor has performed six suspensions since moving to Arizona. Only
the most recent (an Oregon AIDS patient) received a standby. The first
five cases were sudden deaths or deaths with less than two hours warning
at a great distance from Alcor. One was a unexpected death following
surgery in Arizona; one was a probable stroke in Southern California; two
were sudden cardiac problems for elderly members in New York; and one was
a brain cancer patient in New York. Only one of those cases was an
actual terminal illness, and the family had not notified us that the
member was even in the hospital -- because the member had only told one
family member he was a cryonicist at all.
But this is comparing apples with fruit stands. CryoCare's one
suspension (with a fine standby) so far has been in southern California --
where BioPreservation is located. Tim Leary also lives in southern
California. CryoCare only has about 80 members or so, I hear, and a high
percentage of them (as with any new organization) are activists with e-
mail. It is easier to remain in touch with these people when there are
fewer to talk to; and of course standbys next door to are easier than ones
in Boston and New York.
It will be interesting to see if CryoCare has the same enthusiasm,
finances, and logistic ability to handle every member's advance medical
care and long, complex standbys once they, like Alcor, have 380 members
all over the world, many of whom are just "customers" instead of
activists. Cryonics "customers" often don't even inform their suspension
organization when they are ill or hospitalized.
The entire concept of "remote standby" is not well understood by
members of cryonics organizations, and the true range of problems and
costs for this service are still being worked out by suspension leaders
today. CryoCare, being a new organization, has apparently built this into
its upfront costs for membership and suspension funding from the
beginning. Alcor, with 380 members enrolled over a period of more than 20
years, had to deal with many old promises and new "learning experiences"
during that time. It remains to be seen whether CryoCare's concept of how
to afford standby expenses will be workable. For example, right now I
suspect Mike Darwin has doubts about whether or not the system is
sufficient to pay the expenses he has incurred.
But for people new to this concept, let me give some background.
Remote standby service is a transport and stabilization team waiting
near a suspension member when the member may be near death. Over the many
suspensions Alcor has done, the range of waiting time for Standby has been
from zero hours for a sudden death to more than *six weeks* for a cancer
patient who appeared to be within minutes of deanimation several times.
It is obvious from our conversations with Alcor Members that many
have the misconception that standbys are an "automatic" membership
benefit, largely because of the *Cryonics* articles about suspensions in
which standbys were an integral part. And, in fact, for the many years
where Alcor staff (especially Jerry Leaf and Mike Darwin) were building a
transport capability and only doing 1-2 suspensions per year, standbys
were done every chance Alcor could, to learn what was necessary for the
future and because we wanted to give our friends the most service
possible, even at risk of bankrupting the organization. Alcor management
simply hoped that Alcor would be reimbursed for this service or that there
was enough extra funding to cover the costs.
This became a major problem on at least two suspensions where a
standby team was present yet where the patients (for entirely different
reasons) stayed alive much longer than might have been predicted. This
gets expensive, to the tune of $10,000 over the amount of funding
available in one of those cases. Perhaps if Alcor was suspending dozens
of people per year we could average out those losses; but not at the
current rate.
So how can a cryonics organization cover the costs of a standby?
Maybe one can simply raise the rates for suspension coverage for all
members, guarantee complete standby, and hope that the first few
suspensions afterward don't happen to have such expensive standbys that
the company isn't crippled from the beginning. That seems to be the route
that CryoCare has taken, and since they were a new company they set their
rates at whatever seemed best. Anyone switching to them would have to
accept their minimums.
For Alcor that was not so simple. We had many long-time members who
could not easily manage to raise their insurance coverage or other funding
high enough to afford a mass standby plan. And there was some resistance
to the obvious imbalance in that method: some people would pay $5,000
(say) and require no standby while others would require $15,000 in standby
expenses.
Even if we *could* have implemented a plan to raise suspension
minimums to cover standby, the risk to the suspension organization remains
large. Adding life insurance coverage does not benefit the suspension
organization on a standby if the member *survives* the emergency. The
life insurance does not pay off. In that case the suspension organization
will have to find someway to absorb the costs of the standby (or in the
case of CryoCare, pay the expenses of BioPreservation).
So Alcor chose to implement a voluntary plan. All members are given
the chance to provide their own standby coverage. The most common choice
is a dedicated credit card which has a limit of perhaps $5,000. Alcor has
authorization to use the card in case of a standby. If the member
survives, he pays the bill to the credit company. If he is suspended, his
estate (or extra life insurance, if he has it) can pay the bill. Some
members have instituted other plans, with investment accounts, letters of
credit, or advance donations.
This isn't perfect, and we are looking for more methods. We had
hoped years ago to find an insurance company willing to help us develop
some type of "standby insurance," but had no takers. Maybe that will
change someday.
*****
On another subject, another quote from Steve Harris:
>Furthermore, CryoCare even called
>Alcor when it became clear CryoCare wasn't going to be permitted
>to do a very good job for Mr. Leary (a courtesy, BTW, which Alcor
>has certainly never rendered to CryoCare when it found it could
>not serve a prospective Alcor client).
Not exactly true. On at least four occasions I know of personally,
Alcor gave the contact information for all of the cryonics organizations
to people inquiring about possible terminal or post-mortem sign-ups. This
always included CryoCare. True, I did not directly call CryoCare and
invite them to call the individual; I left it up to the prospective member
to make the call himself.
I don't believe any situation quite like the Leary case has existed
for *anyone* in cryonics before, so it is difficult to compare it to what
Alcor may have done in other situations. I certainly did appreciate
CryoCare's concern for Tim Leary and have thanked Charles Platt and Mike
Darwin for letting me know about the problems that were occurring.
Stephen Bridge, President ()
Alcor Life Extension Foundation
Non-profit cryonic suspension services since 1972.
7895 E. Acoma Dr., Suite 110, Scottsdale AZ 85260-6916
Phone (602) 922-9013 (800) 367-2228 FAX (602) 922-9027
for general requests
http://www.alcor.org
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