The Medicalization of Demise and Learn how to Reclaim a Higher Strategy to Die
Previous to the COVID-19 vaccines being launched, many issues had been raised about these experimental gene therapies, together with their potential for inflicting infertility, autoimmune ailments, and most cancers (e.g., most of the theoretical autoimmune points had been summarized by Stefanie Seneff shortly after the vaccines hit the market1).
So, when Pfizer’s regulatory submission to Europe’s FDA (the EMA) was leaked on December 9, 2020,2 I learn via it intimately and found that Pfizer merely had been allowed to exempt itself from testing the vaccine for the above three key points (regardless of that testing being required for gene therapies). Pfizer concluded their best choice was to easily declare believable deniability by insisting they “did not know” their vaccines would do all of that (as a result of they’d “by no means” examined for them).
Regrettably, as a result of spiritual fervor surrounding the vaccine (e.g., that it could rescue us from the lockdowns and return every thing to regular), my arguments to attend on the vaccine largely fell on deaf ears with my colleagues and as a substitute, excuse after excuse was made to dismiss the extremely uncommon and extreme problems our sufferers stored creating instantly after vaccination (e.g., “there is not any proof for this”).
Earlier than lengthy, folks I knew across the nation started contacting me with extreme problems following the vaccination (e.g., dying out of the blue or an aged relative quickly progressing into dementia) to ask if it might be linked to the vaccine.
Hating that there was nothing in any respect I may do to cease this (I felt like an ant in entrance of a tsunami), I then determined I wanted to doc all of them in order that I would a minimum of have some kind of “proof” I may present my skeptical colleagues (as I knew the medical journals would by no means permit vaccine harm datasets to be printed).
Within the strategy of doing that, I got here throughout quite a few circumstances of cancers quickly creating (or dormant ones that had been in remission for years coming again) instantly following COVID vaccination, together with quite a few uncommon circumstances that strongly argued the 2 had been linked. Earlier than lengthy, increasingly more folks observed comparable issues, and the notion of COVID-19 “turbo cancers” entered the cultural lexicon.
Since that point, the medical orthodoxy has denied that this is a matter, however increasingly more datasets are rising displaying it’s.
Scott Adams
When Trump ran for workplace in 2016, initially only a few folks believed Trump may win (e.g., this was proven within the political betting markets). Nevertheless, Dilbert’s writer Scott Adams did, and quickly constructed a big on-line following by highlighting how his coaching as a hypnotist allowed him to acknowledge that Trump was essentially the most politically persuasive candidate and therefore, Scott hypothesized, was favored to win.
As such, as soon as Trump gained, Scott pivoted to utilizing that very same lens (how persuasion shapes political occasions) to turn out to be a pundit on quite a lot of different present points. Throughout that course of, Scott Adams made the controversial choice early on to endorse the COVID vaccine to his followers and to vaccinate.
Word: I do know of a number of different cases the place people who had been lengthy thought-about “specialists in propaganda” made the choice to get the COVID vaccine — one thing which I view as a testomony to only how successfully the vaccine was marketed.
Later, in January 2023, to his nice credit score, Scott posted a video primarily admitting he was mistaken and the anti-vaxxers ended up being totally appropriate.3 Then, on Could 19, 2025, Scott Adams disclosed to his viewers that he had terminal metastatic prostate most cancers, vulnerably shared that he deliberate to make the most of California’s medically assisted dying within the close to future to cut back his struggling.
Scott ultimately tried quite a lot of cutting-edge typical therapies really useful by high oncologists and, amongst different issues, had the Trump administration instantly intervene on his behalf with Kaiser when his entry was abruptly reduce off (highlighting the challenges sufferers with out connections routinely face within the medical system). Nonetheless, nothing labored, and he regularly grew to become weaker and weaker till he mentioned his last goodbyes to his followers and handed away at residence on January 13, 2026.
Altering Relations with Demise
“Persons are so afraid to die that they by no means start to stay.” — Henry Van Dyke
In 1976, Ivan Illich printed Medical Nemesis, which critiqued the medical system and predicted most of the points which emerged within the a long time that adopted. One key theme was that via the medical occupation’s advertising, our cultural conception of demise developed from an intimate, lifelong companion we had no separation from to a feared, medicalized entity to be conquered by docs with demise being outlined by the cessation of mind waves.4
Word: As I present right here, the fashionable criterion for demise is sort of doubtful, current to help organ donations and get rid of the long-term prices of treating vegetative sufferers.
Illich astutely argued that this medicalization, pushed by the medical occupation’s rising management, stripped people of autonomy, turned demise right into a commodity, and strengthened social management via obligatory care. He additionally argued that this Western demise picture had been exported globally, supplanting conventional dying practices and contributing to societal dysfunction by alienating folks from their very own mortality.
Medicalized Demise
Presently, probably the most frequent settings for demise in America is inside the hospital. This nonetheless is controversial as:
• Finish of life care is invasive and uncomfortable (e.g., CPR typically breaks ribs).
• Finish of life care is regularly futile.
• Finish of life care constitutes one of many largest medical bills within the nation.
• Many people don’t wish to let their family members go and therefore insist upon combating for extra medical care.
• Proscribing finish of life care is seen as the federal government selecting to execute folks to save cash.
• Docs who administer finish of life care regularly refuse it for themselves.
For instance, to cite a 2016 article in Time:5
“Docs spend extra of their lives in hospitals than anybody else. However with regards to deciding the place to die, they’re much less probably than the remainder of us to decide on a medical facility, in accordance with new analysis printed within the Journal of the American Medical Affiliation.”6
Word: One other 2016 research discovered 27.9% of physicians vs. 32% of the final inhabitants selected to die in hospitals, and over the past six months of life physicians had been much less prone to have surgical procedure (25.1% vs. 27.4%) and fewer prone to be admitted to the ICU (25.8% vs. 27.6%).7
Likewise, a viral 2011 essay highlighted that docs most popular to die at residence with much less invasive therapies.8
“After all, docs do not wish to die; they wish to stay. However they know sufficient about fashionable drugs to know its limits. And so they know sufficient about demise to know what all folks concern most: dying in ache, and dying alone. They’ve talked about this with their households.
They wish to be certain, when the time comes, that no heroic measures will occur — that they’ll by no means expertise, throughout their final moments on earth, somebody breaking their ribs in an try to resuscitate them with CPR (that is what occurs if CPR is finished proper).”
Word: Many sufferers have no idea that the general survival charge with hospital resuscitation is round 23% to 25%, making it sometimes futile (whereas exterior the hospital CPR hovers nearer to 10%).
Our society has primarily put docs into the position clergymen as soon as occupied, however with out the coaching that position sometimes requires. Docs therefore are regularly sought out for consultations on life and demise regardless of not being spiritually ready for that duty — which inevitably results in points arising. In flip, I and colleagues strongly really feel:
• Medicalized deaths must be averted.
• A case may be made hijacking the dying course of is among the most detrimental issues drugs has finished to humanity.
• Generally, dying at residence is good.
Moreover, in lots of circumstances, hospital care is “futile” as a result of incorrect therapies are being utilized, and fashionable monetary incentives are set in order that docs usually are not sufficiently educated or supported in bringing sick sufferers again to well being (mentioned right here).
Word: A serious motive I’m working so exhausting to construct a strong case for and curiosity in forgotten therapies like ultraviolet blood irradiation and DMSO is that these therapies can radically enhance hospital outcomes (e.g., UVBI regularly cures life threatening infections that don’t reply to traditional therapies, whereas DMSO cures extreme neurological accidents like strokes and traumatic mind accidents drugs has struggled with for many years — to the purpose dozens of readers have now shared DMSO with me saved them from a stroke and the lifetime of “inevitable” incapacity that might have adopted).
Fortuitously, there was some progress on this space, and the proportion of American deaths in hospitals has regularly decreased9 whereas hospice care has turn out to be extra broadly accessible. Sadly, this has dovetailed with medically assisted dying (MAID) being made increasingly more accessible (e.g., in 2024, 5.1% of deaths in Canada had been from MAID10) and MAID regularly being pushed upon sufferers with persistent bodily or psychiatric diseases that socialized medical programs don’t want to deal with.11
Word: One of the vital wonderful tales I found about MAID was that some suppliers solely mean you can obtain MAID you probably have been vaccinated in opposition to COVID.12
Affected person Values
Due to the immense energy docs are entrusted with and the power to hurt others (significantly psychologically and spiritually), medical ethics coaching is significant, however has been largely uncared for in fashionable medical schooling. In medical ethics, one of many foundational premises everyone seems to be taught is that affected person autonomy and values should be revered — however as proven by occasions like COVID vaccine mandates, medical ethics are discarded when it is not handy and interferes with earning profits.
For instance, when Scott realized his situation was terminal, he determined that he needed to spend his remaining time partaking together with his followers via his political podcast as a lot as doable, even when he was on the verge of demise. Had I been in Scott’s place, the very last thing I might be doing in my final days could be being on-line.
Nevertheless, these had been Scott’s values, so once I noticed a submit the place Scott mentioned he anticipated to go within the close to future, I needed to honor them and requested a mutual good friend to relay this message to him:
Me: Hello Scott, I requested ███ to go this alongside to you. Once I noticed Trump’s 2015 response to the Rosie O’Donnell query on the first debate, I felt there was an actual probability he’d win, and shortly after I discovered your weblog. Since then I’ve realized a ton from it and the views I received from you had been one of many issues that made my publication doable. I needed to thanks for the quite a few occasions you’ve got shared my work on X, and I want you the most effective of luck with every thing.
Scott: Thanks for passing that alongside. I am so glad I helped.
Me: Thanks; you helped me loads, and I’ll do my greatest to pay it ahead.
Word: Out of respect for Scott’s autonomy, I intentionally worded my message in order to not ask for something or challenge any emotional wants onto him.
Just a few hours after receiving that message, Scott then posted this on his web page, in flip corroborating that this touched upon the core values he’d adopted on the finish of life:13
Likewise, as soon as he handed an in depth word was posted from his account stating:
• Scott made the choice on his deathbed to transform to Christianity within the hope it could assist him within the afterlife (underscoring how we are going to all inevitably attain a degree the place we want a religious strategy to navigate the dying course of no matter how a lot the subject is ignored and delay).
• That he lived a life succeeding by typical requirements, then ultimately realized what really mattered to him was serving to folks and “I had an incredible life. I gave it every thing I had.”
• He was profoundly grateful for all of the folks his work had positively impacted, and that for those who in any respect benefitted from his work, “In the event you received any advantages from my work, I am asking you to pay it ahead as greatest as you possibly can, that’s the legacy I need.”
Word: All issues thought-about, I really feel Scott dealt with his dying course of fairly effectively (significantly given how far more difficult it’s when numerous persons are concerned in what would in any other case be a really personal course of) and supplied many very important classes on the wholesome methods to navigate demise.
What Actually Issues?
Society at all times revolves round competing events making an attempt to hijack your consideration and sources to realize wealth and energy. Many individuals carry perception programs implanted in them that cause them to pursue issues that don’t convey pleasure or happiness. It’s regularly solely on the finish of life that these unhealthy filters break, and other people understand what really mattered to them. Usually, that’s some mixture of:
• Serving to and positively impacting the lives of others. On the alternative finish, people who harm others are sometimes mentally tortured by it, significantly at demise. I therefore ascribe to the perspective many religious traditions have adopted — that many abhorrent issues people commit would cease if they may perceive what they had been doing to themselves every time they took such actions.
• Being genuine and residing true to oneself somewhat than suppressing who they had been to “succeed,” expressing what they needed to share (e.g., “I am sorry” or “I like you”), and permitting themselves to really feel feelings they’d lengthy bottled up.
• Being near household and buddies who genuinely cared about them.
• Pursuing significant issues with depth somewhat than being trapped in society’s inane distractions.
• Taking time to care for his or her physique and well being somewhat than overexerting themselves within the societal rat race.
This powerfully reinforces why the medicalization of demise is so problematic: the dizzying hospital course of typically strips away autonomy exactly when people most want it. In the meantime, the clear-eyed views of these nearing demise supply one thing invaluable — a uncommon, unfiltered counterweight to society’s stress to chase superficial pursuits that so many later remorse.
Word: It’s also typically vital for the dying particular person’s associates to resolve what they’ve with them earlier than the person passes. Individuals usually profit immensely from some type of decision earlier than demise (e.g., grief will have an effect on them for a a lot shorter interval).
Consciousness and Demise
One of many main tensions inside our tradition has been materialistic science (which successfully grew to become our society’s dominant faith), rejecting the religious side of our existence. Whereas this mechanistic mannequin can clarify many phenomena, it falls brief on points of the human expertise interwoven with spirit.
For instance, to elucidate consciousness (and instinct), a perception was adopted that each one the neurons within the mind permit it to perform as a magical tremendous pc, and due to that, consciousness spontaneously arises together with it subconsciously giving delivery to key points of the human expertise that “unscientific” folks erroneously attribute to religious mechanisms (reminiscent of instinct).
I’ve therefore tried to the touch upon the proof science has collected that undermines its materialistic paradigm, significantly in an article on organ transplantation that mentioned two of the best mysteries in drugs, the place I supplied proof that:
• Many organ transplant recipients (significantly of the center) undertake the preferences, behaviors, recollections, and character traits of donors. These adjustments are sometimes so profound that transference appears the one rationalization — significantly since recipients had no prior strategy to know these traits got here from the donor.
• When CPR is profitable, it creates a modern-day miracle permitting the lifeless to return again to life. A big quantity of experiences have collected of people with “close to demise experiences” remembering what occurred whereas lifeless, with consciousness current exterior the physique (e.g., seeing their physique from above or recalling every thing within the room whereas mind lifeless).14
These factors problem a central dogma of science’s materialistic paradigm — that consciousness resides within the mind and emerges from neural processing. That is significantly poignant for the dying course of, since many who witness deaths report profound occurrences suggesting consciousness transforms and travels at demise somewhat than vanishing into skinny air as soon as the mind “turns off.”
Likewise, this recognition of spirit persisting past the bodily physique was foundational to how each custom which has stood the check of time navigated the demise course of.
Word: Quite a few spiritually attuned docs and nurses I’ve met over time shared that this drew them into hospice care — essentially the most fulfilling a part of their careers due to how a lot they helped sufferers and the profound experiences they’d (some mirroring the literature on “Shared Demise Experiences”15).
Conclusion
Demise is a core aspect of the human expertise, and like many, I deeply consider accepting it somewhat than denying and fearing it’s essential for permitting probably the most essential moments in our life to proceed within the healthiest approach doable.
Likewise, as I’ve tried to indicate right here, I consider the medical business’s try to monopolize demise to extend its market share has been probably the most detrimental issues the medical business has finished to humanity.
With the dying course of, probably the most vital issues is recognizing what the dying particular person really desires and honoring it. My hope is that this text will provide you with essential insights for drafting your individual residing will and superior care directive16 so your autonomy is preserved once you’re least capable of advocate for your self.
Writer’s Word: That is an abridged model of an extended article which matches into better particulars on the factors talked about right here, significantly the religious sides of dying and navigating the demise transition. That article, together with the approaches we have realized are essential for bettering the dying course of may be learn right here.
A Word from Dr. Mercola In regards to the Writer
A Midwestern Physician (AMD) is a board-certified doctor from the Midwest and a longtime reader of Mercola.com. I admire AMD’s distinctive perception on a variety of subjects and am grateful to share it. I additionally respect AMD’s want to stay nameless since AMD remains to be on the entrance strains treating sufferers. To seek out extra of AMD’s work, you’ll want to take a look at The Forgotten Facet of Medication on Substack.
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