[mcherm]

> Except that the drug has negative side effects and does not work-not even with the most optimistic interpretations.

One of the difficult things about ethics (including medical ethics) is that everyone has slightly different opinions.

But in MY opinion, if someone's medical situation has an extremely high likelihood of extremely poor outcomes (terminal cancer and severe Alzheimer's both qualify), then I think it is perfectly acceptable to allow them to use a treatment which is well understood to have no useful effect and many harmful side effects.

I have an ethical problem with encouraging them to do this; I have an ethical problem with profiting from them doing this; but I think that prohibiting them from doing it (as we do today, mostly) is also wrong. EVEN IF the patient is "too stupid to understand it correctly".

[bachmeier]

> I think that prohibiting them from doing it (as we do today, mostly) is also wrong. EVEN IF the patient is "too stupid to understand it correctly".

There's a lot that can be said on this, but it's harder to defend that position if the decision has an effect on others. The obvious situation that arose during the pandemic is someone experimenting and then creating more work for an already overwhelmed hospital system. Then you have to ask about paying to clean up the mess - should it be health insurance, that is paid by everyone else? If you die, what are the effects on your family? How do you draw the line where "well they don't have much time left anyway" vs "they killed themselves experimenting with flu treatment"?