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How refreshing it was to read Ken Walker's article.1 He has the courage to speak out on a subject from which most of us shy away. The major concern of physicians since the time of Hippocrates has been to help prevent pain and suffering; the concept of saving lives at all costs is a modern aberration. In the time of Hippocrates, deformed or malformed babies were put out on the hillside to perish. Of course such a practice would be abhorrent today, but one has to reflect on the enormous cost to our current system of performing heroic procedures on patients whose viability is doubtful.
Footnotes
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Competing interests: None declared.
REFERENCE
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