82-481: Lethality (also called deadliness or perniciousness ) is how capable something is of causing death . Most often it is used when referring to diseases , chemical weapons , biological weapons , or their toxic chemical components. The use of this term denotes the ability of these weapons to kill, but also the possibility that they may not kill. Reasons for the lethality of a weapon to be inconsistent, or expressed by percentage, can be as varied as minimized exposure to
164-412: A postmortem examination or an obduction , is a medical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a human corpse to determine the cause and manner of a person's death and to evaluate any disease or injury that may be present. It is usually performed by a specialized medical doctor called a pathologist . Autopsies are either performed for legal or medical purposes. A forensic autopsy
246-602: A presidential commission issued a landmark report entitled Defining Death: Medical, Legal, and Ethical Issues in the Determination of Death , which rejected the "higher-brain" approach to death in favor of a "whole-brain" definition. This report formed the basis for the Uniform Determination of Death Act , since enacted in 39 states. Today, both the legal and medical communities in the US use "brain death" as
328-558: A coma. In the case of sleep, electroencephalograms (EEGs) are used to tell the difference. The category of "brain death" is seen as problematic by some scholars. For instance, Dr. Franklin Miller, a senior faculty member at the Department of Bioethics, National Institutes of Health, notes: "By the late 1990s... the equation of brain death with death of the human being was increasingly challenged by scholars, based on evidence regarding
410-409: A concept of an afterlife that may hold the idea of judgment of good and bad deeds in one's life. There are also different customs for honoring the body, such as a funeral , cremation , or sky burial . After a death, an obituary may be posted in a newspaper, and the "survived by" kin and friends usually go through the grieving process . The concept of death is the key to human understanding of
492-446: A definition of the moment of death is required, doctors and coroners usually turn to "brain death" or "biological death" to define a person as being dead; people are considered dead when the electrical activity in their brain ceases. It is presumed that an end of electrical activity indicates the end of consciousness . Suspension of consciousness must be permanent and not transient, as occurs during certain sleep stages, and especially
574-429: A former organism normally begin to decompose shortly after death. Death eventually and inevitably occurs in all organisms. Some organisms, such as Turritopsis dohrnii , are biologically immortal ; however, they can still die from means other than aging . Death is generally applied to whole organisms; the equivalent for individual components of an organism, such as cells or tissues , is necrosis . Something that
656-553: A legal definition of death, allowing a person to be declared legally dead even if life support equipment maintains the body's metabolic processes . In the UK, the Royal College of Physicians reported in 1995, abandoning the 1979 claim that the tests published in 1976 sufficed for the diagnosis of brain death, and suggesting a new definition of death based on the irreversible loss of brain-stem function alone. This new definition,
738-425: A living being can survive all calamities but eventually dies due to causes relating to old age. Conversely, premature death can refer to a death that occurs before old age arrives, for example, human death before a person reaches the age of 75. Animal and plant cells normally reproduce and function during the whole period of natural existence, but the aging process derives from the deterioration of cellular activity and
820-488: A person has definitively died has proven difficult. Initially, death was defined as occurring when breathing and the heartbeat ceased, a status still known as clinical death . However, the development of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) meant that such a state was no longer strictly irreversible. Brain death was then considered a more fitting option, but several definitions exist for this. Some people believe that all brain functions must cease. Others believe that even if
902-401: A previous miscarriage, and the use of abortion can increase the chances of having a miscarriage. An abortion may be performed for many reasons, such as pregnancy from rape , financial constraints of having a child, teenage pregnancy , and the lack of support from a significant other . There are two forms of abortion: a medical abortion and an in-clinic abortion or sometimes referred to as
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#1732790578760984-402: A surgical abortion. A medical abortion involves taking a pill that will terminate the pregnancy no more than 11 weeks past the last period , and an in-clinic abortion involves a medical procedure using suction to empty the uterus; this is possible after 12 weeks, but it may be more difficult to find an operating doctor who will go through with the procedure. Senescence refers to a scenario when
1066-441: A vegetative state or coma, in that the former situation describes a state that is beyond recovery. EEGs can detect spurious electrical impulses, while certain drugs, hypoglycemia , hypoxia , or hypothermia can suppress or even stop brain activity temporarily; because of this, hospitals have protocols for determining brain death involving EEGs at widely separated intervals under defined conditions. People maintaining that only
1148-408: Is a finite supply presented at birth. Later, Goldstone proposed the concept of production or income of adaptation energy which may be stored (up to a limit) as a capital reserve of adaptation. In recent works, adaptation energy is considered an internal coordinate on the "dominant path" in the model of adaptation. It is demonstrated that oscillations of well-being appear when the reserve of adaptability
1230-453: Is accepted that if the cause of the dysfunction is a clear physical trauma there is no need to wait that long to establish irreversibility). The patient should have a normal temperature and be free of drugs that can suppress brain activity if the diagnosis is to be made on EEG criteria. Also, a radionuclide cerebral blood flow scan that shows complete absence of intracranial blood flow must be considered with other exams – temporary swelling of
1312-427: Is almost exhausted. In 2012, suicide overtook car crashes as the leading cause of human injury deaths in the U.S., followed by poisoning, falls, and murder. Accidents and disasters, from nuclear disasters to structural collapses , also claim lives. One of the deadliest incidents of all time is the 1975 Banqiao Dam Failure , with varying estimates, up to 240,000 dead. Other incidents with high death tolls are
1394-494: Is an irreversible process where someone loses their existence as a person. Historically, attempts to define the exact moment of a human's death have been subjective or imprecise. Death was defined as the cessation of heartbeat (cardiac arrest) and breathing , but the development of CPR and prompt defibrillation have rendered that definition inadequate because breathing and heartbeat can sometimes be restarted. This type of death where circulatory and respiratory arrest happens
1476-501: Is carried out when the cause of death may be a criminal matter, while a clinical or academic autopsy is performed to find the medical cause of death and is used in cases of unknown or uncertain death, or for research purposes. Autopsies can be further classified into cases where external examination suffices, and those where the body is dissected and an internal examination is conducted. Permission from next of kin may be required for internal autopsy in some cases. Once an internal autopsy
1558-438: Is complete the body is generally reconstituted by sewing it back together. A necropsy, which is not always a medical procedure, was a term previously used to describe an unregulated postmortem examination. In modern times, this term is more commonly associated with the corpses of animals. Death before birth can happen in several ways: stillbirth , when the fetus dies before or during the delivery process; miscarriage , when
1640-567: Is considered the most sensitive confirmatory test in the determination of brain death. While the diagnosis of brain death has become accepted as a basis for the certification of death for legal purposes, it is a very different state from biological death – the state universally recognized and understood as death. The continuing function of vital organs in the bodies of those diagnosed brain-dead, if mechanical ventilation and other life-support measures are continued, provides optimal opportunities for their transplantation. When mechanical ventilation
1722-800: Is considered to have confirmatory value. In the UK it is not considered to be of value because any continuing activity it might reveal in parts of the brain above the brain stem is held to be irrelevant to the diagnosis of death on the Code of Practice criteria. The diagnosis of brain death is often required to be highly rigorous, in order to be certain that the condition is irreversible. Legal criteria vary, but in general require neurological examinations by two independent physicians. The exams must show complete and irreversible absence of brain function (brain stem function in UK), and may include two isoelectric (flat-line) EEGs 24 hours apart (less in other countries where it
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#17327905787601804-883: Is determined by the rate of aging for a species inherent in its genes . A recognized method of extending maximum lifespan is calorie restriction . Theoretically, the extension of the maximum lifespan can be achieved by reducing the rate of aging damage, by periodic replacement of damaged tissues , molecular repair , or rejuvenation of deteriorated cells and tissues. A United States poll found religious and irreligious people, as well as men and women and people of different economic classes, have similar rates of support for life extension, while Africans and Hispanics have higher rates of support than white people. 38% said they would desire to have their aging process cured. Researchers of life extension can be known as "biomedical gerontologists ." They try to understand aging, and develop treatments to reverse aging processes, or at least slow them for
1886-421: Is kept on ventilator support until the organs have been surgically removed. If the patient has indicated in an advance health care directive that they do not wish to receive mechanical ventilation or has specified a do-not-resuscitate (DNR) order and the patient has also indicated that they wish to donate their organs, some vital organs such as the heart and lungs may not be able to be recovered. Brain death
1968-481: Is known as the circulatory definition of death (CDD). Proponents of the CDD believe this definition is reasonable because a person with permanent loss of circulatory and respiratory function should be considered dead. Critics of this definition state that while cessation of these functions may be permanent, it does not mean the situation is irreversible because if CPR is applied fast enough, the person could be revived. Thus,
2050-406: Is more of a process than a single event. It implies a slow shift from one spiritual state to another. Other definitions for death focus on the character of cessation of organismic functioning and human death, which refers to irreversible loss of personhood. More specifically, death occurs when a living entity experiences irreversible cessation of all functioning. As it pertains to human life, death
2132-606: Is not considered an organism, such as a virus , can be physically destroyed but is not said to die , as a virus is not considered alive in the first place. As of the early 21st century, 56 million people die per year. The most common reason is aging , followed by cardiovascular disease , which is a disease that affects the heart or blood vessels . As of 2022, an estimated total of almost 110 billion humans have died, or roughly 94% of all humans to have ever lived. A substudy of gerontology known as biogerontology seeks to eliminate death by natural aging in humans, often through
2214-669: Is now seen as a process, more than an event: conditions once considered indicative of death are now reversible. Where in the process, a dividing line is drawn between life and death depends on factors beyond the presence or absence of vital signs . In general, clinical death is neither necessary nor sufficient for a determination of legal death . A patient with working heart and lungs determined to be brain dead can be pronounced legally dead without clinical death occurring. Life extension refers to an increase in maximum or average lifespan , especially in humans, by slowing or reversing aging processes through anti-aging measures. Aging
2296-501: Is something humans share with cetaceans called the mammalian diving reflex . As medical technologies advance, ideas about when death occurs may have to be reevaluated in light of the ability to restore a person to vitality after longer periods of apparent death (as happened when CPR and defibrillation showed that cessation of heartbeat is inadequate as a decisive indicator of death). The lack of electrical brain activity may not be enough to consider someone scientifically dead. Therefore,
2378-483: Is the most common cause of death worldwide. Aging is seen as inevitable, so according to Aubrey de Grey little is spent on research into anti-aging therapies, a phenomenon known as pro-aging trance . The average lifespan is determined by vulnerability to accidents and age or lifestyle-related afflictions such as cancer or cardiovascular disease . Extension of lifespan can be achieved by good diet , exercise, and avoidance of hazards such as smoking . Maximum lifespan
2460-426: Is unresponsive coma, the absence of brain-stem reflexes and the absence of respiratory centre function, in the clinical setting in which these findings are irreversible. In particular, there must be definite clinical or neuro-imaging evidence of acute brain pathology (e.g. traumatic brain injury, intracranial haemorrhage, hypoxic encephalopathy) consistent with the irreversible loss of neurological function." In Brazil,
2542-527: Is used to support the body of a brain-dead organ donor pending a transplant into an organ recipient, the donor's date of death is listed as the date that brain death was diagnosed. In some countries (for instance, Spain , Finland , the United Kingdom , Portugal , France , and by 2026 Switzerland ), everyone is automatically an organ donor after diagnosis of death on legally accepted criteria, although some jurisdictions (such as Singapore , Spain,
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2624-463: Is viewed as problematic by some scholars, there are proponents of it that believe this definition of death is the most reasonable for distinguishing life from death. The reasoning behind the support for this definition is that brain death has a set of criteria that is reliable and reproducible. Also, the brain is crucial in determining our identity or who we are as human beings. The distinction should be made that "brain death" cannot be equated with one in
2706-586: The 1931 China floods , which killed an estimated 4 million people, although estimates widely vary; the 1887 Yellow River flood , which killed an estimated 2 million people in China; and the 1970 Bhola cyclone , which killed as many as 500,000 people in Pakistan. If naturally occurring famines are considered natural disasters, the Chinese famine of 1906–1907 , which killed 15–20 million people, can be considered
2788-525: The Wanggongchang explosion (when a gunpowder factory ended up with 20,000 deaths), a collapse of a wall of Circus Maximus that killed 13,000 people, and the Chernobyl disaster that killed between 95 and 4,000 people. Natural disasters kill around 45,000 people annually, although this number can vary to millions to thousands on a per-decade basis. Some of the deadliest natural disasters are
2870-458: The brainstem is still alive, the personality and identity are irretrievably lost, so therefore, the person should be considered entirely dead. Brain death is sometimes used as a legal definition of death. For all organisms with a brain, death can instead be focused on this organ. The cause of death is usually considered important and an autopsy can be done. There are many causes, from accidents to diseases. Many cultures and religions have
2952-592: The brainstem . The distinctions are medically significant because, for example, in someone with a dead cerebrum but a living brainstem, spontaneous breathing may continue unaided, whereas in whole-brain death (which includes brainstem death ), only life support equipment would maintain ventilation . In certain countries, patients classified as brain-dead may legally have their organs surgically removed for organ donation . Differences in operational definitions of death have obvious medicolegal implications (in medical jurisprudence and medical law ). Traditionally, both
3034-544: The caloric reflex test , and no spontaneous respirations . Brain death can sometimes be difficult to differentiate from other medical states such as barbiturate overdose , acute alcohol poisoning , sedative overdose, hypothermia , hypoglycemia , coma , and chronic vegetative states . Some comatose patients can recover to pre-coma or near pre-coma level of functioning, and some patients with severe irreversible neurological dysfunction will nonetheless retain some lower brain functions, such as spontaneous respiration, despite
3116-485: The embryo dies before independent survival; and abortion , the artificial termination of the pregnancy. Stillbirth and miscarriage can happen for various reasons, while abortion is carried out purposely. Stillbirth can happen right before or after the delivery of a fetus. It can result from defects of the fetus or risk factors present in the mother. Reductions of these factors, caesarean sections when risks are present, and early detection of birth defects have lowered
3198-454: The neo-cortex of the brain is necessary for consciousness sometimes argue that only electrical activity should be considered when defining death. Eventually, the criterion for death may be the permanent and irreversible loss of cognitive function, as evidenced by the death of the cerebral cortex . All hope of recovering human thought and personality is then gone, given current and foreseeable medical technology. Even by whole-brain criteria,
3280-453: The 20th century and could kill 1 billion people worldwide in the 21st century, a World Health Organization report warned. Many leading developed world causes of death can be postponed by diet and physical activity , but the accelerating incidence of disease with age still imposes limits on human longevity . The evolutionary cause of aging is, at best, only beginning to be understood. It has been suggested that direct intervention in
3362-503: The Federal Council of Medicine revised its regulations in 2017, including "a requirement for the patient to meet specific physiological prerequisites and for the physician to provide optimized care to the patient before starting the procedures for diagnosing brain death and to perform complementary tests, as well as the need for specific training for physicians who make this diagnosis." In 2020, an international panel of experts,
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3444-702: The President's Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical and Behavioral Research in 1980. They concluded that this approach to defining death sufficed in reaching a uniform definition nationwide. A multitude of reasons was presented to support this definition, including uniformity of standards in law for establishing death, consumption of a family's fiscal resources for artificial life support, and legal establishment for equating brain death with death to proceed with organ donation . Aside from
3526-594: The United Kingdom, France, Czech Republic , Poland and Portugal) allow opting out of the system. Elsewhere, consent from family members or next-of-kin may be required for organ donation. In New Zealand , Australia and most states in the United States , drivers are asked upon application if they wish to be registered as an organ donor. In the United States, if the patient is at or near death,
3608-550: The United Nations Special Reporter on the Right to Food, 2000 – Mar 2008, mortality due to malnutrition accounted for 58% of the total mortality rate in 2006. Ziegler says worldwide, approximately 62 million people died from all causes and of those deaths, more than 36 million died of hunger or diseases due to deficiencies in micronutrients . Tobacco smoking killed 100 million people worldwide in
3690-484: The World Brain Death Project, published a guideline that: provides recommendations for the minimum clinical standards for determination of brain death/death by neurologic criteria (BD/DNC) in adults and children with clear guidance for various clinical circumstances. The recommendations have widespread international society endorsement and can serve to guide professional societies and countries in
3772-428: The after-effects of a major chemical or oil/gas process loss of containment, causing fire, explosion, or a toxic cloud. Lethality curves can be developed in process safety to assess and describe mortality patterns around the accident location. The impact is typically greatest closest to the event site and lessens to the outskirts of the impact zone. Blast overpressure , thermal radiation , toxicity and location affect
3854-404: The aging process may now be the most effective intervention against major causes of death. Selye proposed a unified non-specific approach to many causes of death. He demonstrated that stress decreases the adaptability of an organism and proposed to describe adaptability as a special resource, adaptation energy . The animal dies when this resource is exhausted. Selye assumed that adaptability
3936-414: The application of natural processes found in certain organisms. However, as humans do not have the means to apply this to themselves, they have to use other ways to reach the maximum lifespan for a human, often through lifestyle changes, such as calorie reduction , dieting , and exercise . The idea of lifespan extension is considered and studied as a way for people to live longer. Determining when
4018-444: The arguments for and against the CDD boil down to defining the actual words "permanent" and "irreversible," which further complicates the challenge of defining death. Furthermore, events causally linked to death in the past no longer kill in all circumstances; without a functioning heart or lungs, life can sometimes be sustained with a combination of life support devices, organ transplants , and artificial pacemakers . Today, where
4100-439: The array of biological functioning displayed by patients correctly diagnosed as having this condition who were maintained on mechanical ventilation for substantial periods of time. These patients maintained the ability to sustain circulation and respiration, control temperature, excrete wastes, heal wounds, fight infections and, most dramatically, to gestate fetuses (in the case of pregnant "brain-dead" women)." While "brain death"
4182-501: The brain must have completely ceased. However, in other jurisdictions, some follow the brainstem version of brain death. Afterward, a death certificate is issued in most jurisdictions, either by a doctor or by an administrative office, upon presentation of a doctor's declaration of death. There are many anecdotal references to people being declared dead by physicians and then "coming back to life," sometimes days later in their coffin or when embalming procedures are about to begin. From
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#17327905787604264-415: The brain or brain stem; these cells come from the spinal cord. Sometimes these body movements can cause false hope for family members. A brain-dead individual has no clinical evidence of brain function upon physical examination . This includes no response to pain and no cranial nerve reflexes . Reflexes include pupillary response (fixed pupils), oculocephalic reflex , corneal reflex , no response to
4346-762: The brain, particularly within the first 72 hours, can lead to a false positive test on a patient that may recover with more time. CT angiography is neither required nor sufficient test to make the diagnosis. Confirmatory testing is only needed under the age of 1. For children and adults, testing is optional. Other situations possibly requiring confirmatory testing include severe facial trauma where determination of brainstem reflexes will be difficult, pre-existing pupillary abnormalities, and patients with severe sleep apnea and/or pulmonary disease. Confirmatory tests include: cerebral angiography, electroencephalography, transcranial Doppler ultrasonography, and cerebral scintigraphy (technetium Tc 99m exametazime). Cerebral angiography
4428-471: The concept of information-theoretic death has been suggested as a better means of defining when true death occurs, though the concept has few practical applications outside the field of cryonics . The leading cause of human death in developing countries is infectious disease . The leading causes in developed countries are atherosclerosis ( heart disease and stroke), cancer, and other diseases related to obesity and aging . By an extremely wide margin,
4510-550: The deadliest natural disaster in recorded history. In animals, predation can be a common cause of death. Livestock have a 6% death rate from predation. However, younger animals are more susceptible to predation. For example, 50% of young foxes die to birds , bobcats , coyotes , and other foxes as well. Young bear cubs in the Yellowstone National Park only have a 40% chance to survive to adulthood from other bears and predators. An autopsy, also known as
4592-411: The degree of lethality. Lethality is also a term used by microbiologists and food scientists as a measure of the ability of a process to destroy bacteria. Lethality may be determined by enumeration of survivors after incremental exposures. Death Death is the end of life ; the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain a living organism . The remains of
4674-493: The determination of brain death can be complicated. At present, in most places, the more conservative definition of death (irreversible cessation of electrical activity in the whole brain, as opposed to just in the neo-cortex) has been adopted. One example is the Uniform Determination Of Death Act in the United States. In the past, the adoption of this whole-brain definition was a conclusion of
4756-439: The figure to be closer to 800. In cases of electric shock , cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) for an hour or longer can allow stunned nerves to recover, allowing an apparently dead person to survive. People found unconscious under icy water may survive if their faces are kept continuously cold until they arrive at an emergency room . This "diving response," in which metabolic activity and oxygen requirements are minimal,
4838-434: The flaws in this approach is that there are many organisms that are alive but probably not conscious. Another problem is in defining consciousness, which has many different definitions given by modern scientists, psychologists and philosophers. Additionally, many religious traditions, including Abrahamic and Dharmic traditions, hold that death does not (or may not) entail the end of consciousness. In certain cultures, death
4920-487: The hospital must notify a designated Organ Procurement Organization (OPO) of the details, and maintain the patient while the patient is being evaluated for suitability as a donor. The OPO searches to see if the deceased is registered as a donor, which serves as legal consent; if the deceased has not registered or otherwise noted consent (e.g., on a driver's license), the OPO will ask the next of kin for authorization. The patient
5002-565: The improvement of health and maintenance of youthfulness. Those who use life extension findings and apply them to themselves are called "life extensionists" or "longevists." The primary life extension strategy currently is to apply anti-aging methods to attempt to live long enough to benefit from a cure for aging. Brain death Brain death is the permanent, irreversible, and complete loss of brain function , which may include cessation of involuntary activity necessary to sustain life. It differs from persistent vegetative state , in which
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#17327905787605084-402: The irreversible loss of the capacity for consciousness and for spontaneous breathing, and the essentially unchanged 1976 tests held to establish that state, have been adopted as a basis of death certification for organ transplant purposes in subsequent Codes of Practice. The Australia and New Zealand Intensive Care Society (ANZICS) states that the "determination of brain death requires that there
5166-483: The issue of support of or dispute against brain death, there is another inherent problem in this categorical definition: the variability of its application in medical practice. In 1995, the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) established the criteria that became the medical standard for diagnosing neurologic death. At that time, three clinical features had to be satisfied to determine "irreversible cessation" of
5248-487: The jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii , the hydra , and the planarian . Unnatural causes of death include suicide and predation . Of all causes, roughly 150,000 people die around the world each day. Of these, two-thirds die directly or indirectly due to senescence, but in industrialized countries – such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany – the rate approaches 90% (i.e., nearly nine out of ten of all deaths are related to senescence). Physiological death
5330-476: The largest unifying cause of death in the developed world is biological aging, leading to various complications known as aging-associated diseases . These conditions cause loss of homeostasis , leading to cardiac arrest, causing loss of oxygen and nutrient supply, causing irreversible deterioration of the brain and other tissues . Of the roughly 150,000 people who die each day across the globe, about two thirds die of age-related causes. In industrialized nations,
5412-431: The legal and medical communities determined death through the permanent end of certain bodily functions in clinical death , especially respiration and heartbeat . With the increasing ability of the medical community to resuscitate people with no respiration, heartbeat, or other external signs of life, the need for another definition of death occurred, raising questions of legal death . This gained greater urgency with
5494-414: The losses of both cortex and brain stem functionality. Such is the case with anencephaly . Brain electrical activity can stop completely, or drop to such a low level as to be undetectable with most equipment. An EEG will therefore be flat, though this is sometimes also observed during deep anesthesia or cardiac arrest . Although in the United States a flat EEG test is not required to certify death, it
5576-583: The mid-18th century onwards, there was an upsurge in the public's fear of being mistakenly buried alive and much debate about the uncertainty of the signs of death. Various suggestions were made to test for signs of life before burial, ranging from pouring vinegar and pepper into the corpse's mouth to applying red hot pokers to the feet or into the rectum . Writing in 1895, the physician J.C. Ouseley claimed that as many as 2,700 people were buried prematurely each year in England and Wales, although some estimates peg
5658-466: The moment when life ends. Determining when death has occurred is difficult, as cessation of life functions is often not simultaneous across organ systems. Such determination, therefore, requires drawing precise conceptual boundaries between life and death. This is difficult due to there being little consensus on how to define life. It is possible to define life in terms of consciousness. When consciousness ceases, an organism can be said to have died. One of
5740-447: The other hand, believe that the rule does not uphold the best interests of the donors and that the rule does not effectively promote organ donation. Signs of death or strong indications that a warm-blooded animal is no longer alive are: The stages that follow after death are: The death of a person has legal consequences that may vary between jurisdictions. Most countries follow the whole-brain death criteria, where all functions of
5822-437: The person is alive and some autonomic functions remain. It is also distinct from comas as long as some brain and bodily activity and function remain, and it is also not the same as the condition locked-in syndrome . A differential diagnosis can medically distinguish these differing conditions. Brain death is used as an indicator of legal death in many jurisdictions, but it is defined inconsistently and often confused by
5904-420: The phenomenon. There are many scientific approaches and various interpretations of the concept. Additionally, the advent of life-sustaining therapy and the numerous criteria for defining death from both a medical and legal standpoint have made it difficult to create a single unifying definition. One of the challenges in defining death is in distinguishing it from life. As a point in time, death seems to refer to
5986-628: The proportion is much higher, approaching 90%. With improved medical capability, dying has become a condition to be managed . In developing nations , inferior sanitary conditions and lack of access to modern medical technology make death from infectious diseases more common than in developed countries . One such disease is tuberculosis , a bacterial disease that killed 1.8 million people in 2015. In 2004, malaria caused about 2.7 million deaths annually. The AIDS death toll in Africa may reach 90–100 million by 2025. According to Jean Ziegler ,
6068-486: The public. Various parts of the brain may keep functioning when others do not anymore, and the term "brain death" has been used to refer to various combinations. For example, although one major medical dictionary considers "brain death" to be synonymous with "cerebral death" (death of the cerebrum ), the US National Library of Medicine Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) system defines brain death as including
6150-673: The rate of stillbirth. However, 1% of births in the United States end in a stillbirth. A miscarriage is defined by the World Health Organization as, "The expulsion or extraction from its mother of an embryo or fetus weighing 500g or less." Miscarriage is one of the most frequent problems in pregnancy, and is reported in around 12–15% of all clinical pregnancies ; however, by including pregnancy losses during menstruation , it could be up to 17–22% of all pregnancies. There are many risk-factors involved in miscarriage; consumption of caffeine , tobacco , alcohol , drugs, having
6232-467: The revision or development of protocols and procedures for determination of brain death/death by neurologic criteria, leading to greater consistency within and between countries. Natural movements also known as the Lazarus sign or Lazarus reflex can occur on a brain-dead person whose organs have been kept functioning by life support. The living cells that can cause these movements are not living cells from
6314-722: The ruination of regular functioning. The aptitude of cells for gradual deterioration and mortality means that cells are naturally sentenced to stable and long-term loss of living capacities, even despite continuing metabolic reactions and viability. In the United Kingdom, for example, nine out of ten of all the deaths that occur daily relates to senescence, while around the world, it accounts for two-thirds of 150,000 deaths that take place daily. Almost all animals who survive external hazards to their biological functioning eventually die from biological aging , known in life sciences as "senescence." Some organisms experience negligible senescence , even exhibiting biological immortality . These include
6396-433: The rule: there must be an official declaration of death in a person before starting organ procurement, or that organ procurement cannot result in the death of the donor. A great deal of controversy has surrounded the definition of death and the dead donor rule. Advocates of the rule believe that the rule is legitimate in protecting organ donors while also countering any moral or legal objection to organ procurement. Critics, on
6478-430: The state of Kansas had enacted a similar law earlier. An ad hoc committee at Harvard Medical School published a pivotal 1968 report to define irreversible coma . The Harvard criteria gradually gained consensus toward what is now known as brain death. In the wake of the 1976 Karen Ann Quinlan case , state legislatures in the United States moved to accept brain death as an acceptable indication of death. In 1981,
6560-414: The total brain, including coma with clear etiology, cessation of breathing, and lack of brainstem reflexes. These criteria were updated again, most recently in 2010, but substantial discrepancies remain across hospitals and medical specialties. The problem of defining death is especially imperative as it pertains to the dead donor rule , which could be understood as one of the following interpretations of
6642-436: The weapon, previous exposure to the weapon minimizing susceptibility, degradation of the weapon over time and/or distance, and incorrect deployment of a multi-component weapon. This term can also refer to the after-effects of weapon use, such as nuclear fallout , which has highest lethality nearest the deployment site, and in proportion to the subject's size and nature; e.g. a child or small animal. Lethality can also refer to
6724-410: The widespread use of life support equipment and the rising capabilities and demand for organ transplantation . Since the 1960s, laws governing the determination of death have been implemented in all countries that have active organ transplantation programs. The first European country to adopt brain death as a legal definition (or indicator) of death was Finland in 1971, while in the United States ,
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