, Columnist
A Scary Plan to Revise the Definition of Death
People may be less willing to agree to be organ donors if they believe the quest for organs changes how patients are treated.
At death’s door, maybe, but you are still alive.
Photographer: Bing Guan/Bloomberg
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Death can’t be denied but it can be edited.
In 1981, the Uniform Law Commission proposed a model law for the determination of death. It says that individuals have died when they have experienced an irreversible end to either their respiratory and circulatory functions or their brain functions. Most states have adopted this definition, and the rest adopted it in substance if not precise wording.