Seems like a failure in pacemaker design? The pacemaker kill switch should simply need much stronger magnets so there is no confusion between mobile phone or the kill switch key.
The point is that it is fairly easy to trigger. This is considered safer than having a hard to trigger mechanism and less user caution, because of greater chance of it failing to be triggered when needed. You could have some sort of complex signal sent that switches them, but it'd make the devices much more complex, and since they are very hard to service, and need to respond when triggered, they are designed to be simple. Users of these devices aren't supposed to have phones near them anyway.
> Users of these devices aren't supposed to have phones near them anyway.
And people are using them anyway.
I understand that the current design was made in a different world, but that doesn't mean that pacemaker design is supposed to stagnate. It definitely can and should be hardened to take into account modern environment.
> The pacemaker kill switch should simply need much stronger magnets
'simply' here is code for 'will require changes, perhaps significant, to therapeutic processes and medical infrastructure in hospitals and other medical facilities across the planet'.
Pacemakers do need to be serviced and replaced every once in a while, so this isn't end of the world scenario. Even better, stronger magnets would work for both "old" and "new" devices, so no need for two "disable" keys.