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Comment by markdown | Hacker News Reader

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Sick people don't make the best decisions especially while they are dying.

He had multiple years and plenty of time when he was sound of mind.

Most people listen to medical experts instead of hippie crystal therapy like Steve chose, and when that didn’t work, he used his wealth and privilege to establish residency in a state where he could jump in line for a liver transplant, got it, was too far gone and died anyway. Wasted a perfectly good liver on that sociopath.

Fortunately for us, nobody will ever care enough to scrutinize and pick apart the stupid/selfish things we did in our lives.

Don’t fall for the great man fallacy, nor its opposite, the villain fallacy. It’s just oversimplified media narratives.

Most people are complicated.

> because I knew better.

It's not because he knew better, but because he didn't like it. And frankly, who can blame him? The survival rate from pancreatic cancer is quite low, as is the median life expectancy. Moreover, he had the misfortune of getting a more aggressive variant. And the treatment is quite heavy.

Nevertheless, if it was me, everything considered, I'd still try to take my chances. And I believe most people would do the same. It's a pity, because there is still some chance he could still be around.

The survival rate increase dramatically with wealth

Also pancreatic cancer that was likely comorbid with his dietary choices, to begin with, so it's not just about the treatment of choice.

It read like pile of self serving bs, given how he treated others around him.

Judge people by actions not words.

Given the complexities of the Whipple procedure, I'm not sure I would go through with it either, honestly.

I'm not a doctor, but I've dealt with a looot of oncologists, and with people at the end of life from cancer. Most cancer docs would choose to go through with far less cancer treatments than their patients typically choose.

His tumor was caught early and easily operable (it was a rare type of pancreatic cancer that was). No doctor would have suggested he ignore the surgical option for diet etc, changes. By the time he changed his mind/it got worse, his options were much more limited.

> easily operable

I could be wrong, but I thought the operation was a Whipple procedure, and the concern I lay out is that the operation is not easy.

Even then he had options only the 1% can do - move to a state to cut in line. Still didn’t work. I think he was just trying to hang in long enough to see his $200M yacht get finished and in the water. Oops.

The Whipple procedure in pancreatic cancer is usually only performed with curative intent. It's not a palliative treatment. I think most people, when faced with the possibility of getting a cure for pancreatic cancer (which, believe me, it's not a nice cancer at all) would choose to go with that procedure.

Well of course doctors would - they’re not going through it so don’t have all the emotional baggage the patients do.

I think you misunderstand - they're saying that the doctors would elect to receive less treatments than the average patient if they themselves were sick - presumably because they are well aware of the low likelihood of success and the brutality of going through it.

I'm not a physician, either, but this rings true with experiences from my own life, were people I knew who were doctors decided early to stop treatment and let the disease run its course (and subsequently passed away).

The person you are replying to is saying that doctors often choose to forgo treatment options that their patients undergo.

See https://hms.harvard.edu/news/how-doctors-die - "Physicians are less likely than the general population to undergo intense end-of-life treatments"

Is this Steve Jobs's word?

Also extremely strange is he received a liver transplant much quicker than average, in a state far from where he lived, which later received a $40mil anonymous donation

https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2015/11/12/hospital-where-jobs-rece...

I'm honestly not sure why this was never more complained about. He ignored medical advice, that's fine I guess, his right. But he effectively stole a liver from someone and essentially wasted it. Must be nice to have FU money.

I’d rather be alive, living my non-rich, non-famous life than to have FU money and be dead.

I think the point is that someone who is non-rich and non-famous might also be non-alive because of this missing liver.

Isn't that one of the big positives of being rich? You can use your funds to get anything that civilization has to offer. If you are salty about this then it's not even a far reach to be salty about rich people in general. They have better food, better entertainment, less pollution around them etc, etc. Which all leads to them having a more longer and fulfilling life in general.

It's one of the positives of being rich in a plutocracy.

Whether plutocracy is a good, never mind ideal, way to organise a planetary culture is very much up for debate.

Definitely! My point was more that I find it odd to see the exact same mechanism all around you every day and then throw your hands up in disgust on this specific instance.

This is disgusting because someone more deserving died when he took the liver that was going to them.

Which other every-day mechanisms results in the death of one of two parties?

The list I posted. Better food and being around less polution literally increases your life expectancy by years.

Given something like 40% of liver transplants go to people with alcohol related diseases this doesn’t bother me too much.

I don't understand your point. Is it "fuck people with addiction issues"?

Let's not pretend rich people don't skip the line. I mean, it's so obvious it would happen, and no amount of regulation will prevent that because whoever is involved can easily be corrupted with FU money.

For sure. That’s the whole basis of healthcare in the US; the more money you have the better it is. I don’t agree with it and I’m glad my country does this differently up to a point but I don’t see why this particular incident is surprising or unfair if that’s the system Americans have decided to live with.

Ah yes, the old organ switcharoo.

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