Honestly, I don’t think taxpayer expense is part of the thought process. To a lot of people, PAYING for this sort of thing is so absolutely removed from any part of the thought process. Hospitals have the equipment, the doctors are already there, why not? The idea that a bed used for this cannot be used for something else is confusing - there is a limit to how many beds are available? Insurance companies are huge non-human entities with unlimited resources. And when you do bring up the cost, and get through to them that SOMEONE will need to provide resources, and those resources cost money, you get an aphorism like “you can’t put a cost on human life.”
I wondered about this too, and then realized what “homeostasis” really meant - while we’re alive, our bodies make constant self-adjustments to remain that way. Trying to forcibly replicate this through machines and chemicals is like using a prosthetic leg - at best a crude, limited replacement - and I can see why it’s only a short-term… well, I hesitate to say “solution”, because it isn’t… process.
Do people really not understand that, yes, if we use a bed for one body, we can’t put another person in it? When you come in through the ER and have to wait for hours for a bed in the main hospital, it’s not because they’re lazy meanie pants, it’s usually because there isn’t a bed available, or maybe there’s a bed but not a nurse available. The hospital doesn’t keep nurses in vending machines… if the floor or the ICU gets a new patient and everyone’s got a full roster, they’ve got to start making phone calls and find someone willing to come in who has the appropriate level of training for this patient. They work very hard to maximize patient to nurse ratios, but even the most backbreaking ICU tries to keep it to no more than 3 patients toa nurse. And they don’t keep extra nurses on shift, either. If itlooks like a low census for the shift, nurses get sent home (without pay) just like in other service industries. Hospitals don’t have an endless supply of beds or nurses. Do people really not get that?
You’ve described the problem perfectly. They’re emoting, not thinking. Of course we put a cost on human life - and judging from the fact that many children in countries less wealthy than ours suffer and even die from conditions that are perfectly treatable, that price is pretty damned low. When all the living people on the planet have their essential health care needs met, then we can talk about whether it’s reasonable to use health care resources to perform Frankensteinian procedures on dead bodies.
That’s why I snapped at Rachellogram upthread when she defended the folks who are donating their money to the McMath family to pay for all this futile care of a corpse. People have a right to donate to whatever charitable cause they choose, but some causes are worthier than others - and this one is at the very bottom of the barrel. Jahi doesn’t need healthcare, she needs a dignified funeral.
I think Dangerosa is right - some folks really do not get that. The day-to-day workings of our healthcare system are not seen by them, and so is the suffering of those who can’t access modern healthcare. So they really don’t see any reason why a cute little girl (who incidentally is dead) needs to be taken off the ventilator. Who’s being harmed by keeping her on it? The cost (both financial and human) of expending healthcare resources on a dead person is invisible to them.
Of course not. Nurses are kept in linen closets. You’ve got to be an MD to rank storage in a vending machine. 
No, they really don’t. Its one of the reasons that insurance companies do co-pays and send statements - they want you to see the cost. Unfortunately, people have bought into the $40 aspirin like they’ve bought into the $100 ashtray - they don’t believe it even when exposed to the costs. Everyone is making piles of money and they don’t trust hospital administration.
You see the same arguments in the naive portion of the anti-abortion movement - there are plenty of adoptive homes for these “saved children” to find a soft landing. But, there aren’t - not for the abortions that are happening because of genetic defects, not for the kids whose mothers had a drug habit. Every baby whose white birthmother can’t parent right now because she is busy finishing her law degree at Harvard will find a home.
Most people have a very shallow understanding of consequences. And when you throw in how economics work (and even if you take money out of the equation - having a nurse on staff to keep the nurse/patient ratio acceptable is an economics problem) - yeah, its far and away above most people’s abilities to understand. Throw in emotional involvement on top of it - its a little girl, there might be a racial component…yeah.
Only the Residents, though, right? Attendings are dropped off by Amazon drones, I believe.
sigh Yeah, you’re right, Dangerosa. I know you’re right. It just wearies me that, when you get right down to it, people view hospitals as all powerful, and nurses and doctors aren’t actual people. I have to get over it, or get better beta-blockers. 
People are really bad at understanding SOMEONE ELSE’S resources - and it isn’t just the medical profession. Universities should open their doors to all students - the classrooms and teachers are there, right? No one expects a T.A. to get paid for grading extra papers. The classrooms wouldn’t fill up? More professors will just appear. Employers should just hire more people - and pay them more. They may not be profitable enough to do either, but you know, that’s solved by hand waving. Your neighbor who is a stay at home mom - she should just take your kids when they have the day off school - she isn’t doing anything, and why wouldn’t she want a house full of kids for a day that she needs to watch and feed for no compensation.
Hell, many people are really bad at understanding their own resources - they over schedule their time and over spend their money - is it any surprise that they look at hospitals as a magic bag of holding.
It’s rare, but it happens.
Bolding mine.
3 months in this case.
4 weeks in this case.
I’d love to see any evidence of it. Three months seems to be the limit with the baby delivered as soon as possible. At 14-15 weeks, I doubt any doctor is going to suggest carrying the baby to full term.
It’s likely the only function being controlled by a machine at this point is the mechanical aspect of her breathing. Gas exchange is a passive diffusion process, the heart has an intrinsic pacemaker, there are pressure receptors in the ascending aortic arch that trigger the kidneys to excrete or retain fluid. It’s an amazing device, and a lot of it runs on auto pilot, but not all of it, and not for long.
The process of having tubes placed and pulled from the trachea and being bounced around likely caused increased secretions and vagus nerve stimulation, which could lead to fluctuations in her pulse, B/P, and O2 and CO2 levels, as well as temperature changes. Maybe big fluctuations, maybe not, but measurable ones that will stabilize after they stop fiddleing with her.
Also dead in this case; the baby was born with severe issues only survived a few weeks.
And aside from glurgy stuff months later reporting the births as “a few days ago,” I can’t find any articles about the outcome of this one. The last real report was a few days after the birth, and both babies were in “fragile” condition then.
So we’re still not looking at much hope.
I found one articlewhich said the twins (21 weeks gestation at time of their mother’s death, kept in the uterus 4 weeks longer) were still in the NICU on ventilators, “still frail and fluctuate between losing and gaining weight,” not quite 3 months later. Not bad, but I can find no further updates. Don’t know if they survived or not, or if they were disabled.
Still, I don’t think it’s anything comparable to maternal death at 14 weeks and postmortem gestation for even another 10 weeks, if we’re not concerned with going to term.
I hope I am wrong, really I do, but those sadly don’t convince me.
ETA: And, not to put too fine a point on it, 21 weeks gestation was where my daughter was born. It’s the borderline of viable with an excellent top level NICU. So they used the mother’s body as an incubator for a *viable *preterm fetus. Amazing, but different.
::raises hand:: I have a question: since her body was released to the coroner, was a Death Certificate issued? I don’t think I have seen anything on that.
Yes, the coroner issued a death certificate. I think that was a condition of her release into her mother’s custody- being declared legally dead. Her legal date of death is December 12th. This article mentions it: http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/06/health/jahi-mcmath-girl-brain-dead/
Thank you for the link, CatherineZeta.
Are you sure this is the same case? The story dates from November and states that the baby, born in July, was healthy and at home with family, so he has to have survived for at least four months. I can’t find any later updates.
Could be, or I could be confusing it with the one mentioned at the bottom of that same article. I don’t recall what site I was looking at, sorry.
Ok, WhyNot asked for a case of a brain dead mother carrying a pregnancy for six months and delivering a healthy baby and I did not find that. What I linked to was a mother, brain dead from 15 weeks gestation, delivering a healthy baby that has since been discharged from the hospital. I find that very relevant to this case of a mother, brain dead from 14 weeks gestation, and I think your objection that it wasn’t a six month period on life support is ridiculous. The important part of the outcome is not the duration of gestation in brain dead condition; the important part is that a person in a brain dead condition from a similar point in pregnancy was delivered of a healthy baby.
Please note that I’m not actually advocating for prolonging life support in this particular case. I just chipped in because everyone seems to think it’s a foregone conclusion that the fetus can not be kept alive until it can be delivered with a hope of survival. It has happened, albeit rarely.