Very old people do raise moral problems for almost everyone who comes into c

Very old people do raise moral problems for almost everyone who comes into contact with them. Their values, this can’t be repeated too often, are not necessarily our values. Physical comfort, cleanness and order are necessarily the most important things. The social services from time to time find themselves faced with a flat with decaying food covered by small worms, and an old person lying alone on bed, taking no notice of the worms But is it interfering with personal freedom to insist that they go to live with some of their relatives so that they might be taken better care of? Some social workers, the ones who clear up the worms, think we are in danger of carrying this concept of personal freedom to the point where serious risks are being taken with the health and safety of the old.
    Indeed, the old can be easily hurt or harmed. The body is like a car:it needs more mechanical maintenance, as it gets older. You can carry this comparison right through to the provision of spare parts. But never forget that such operations are painful experiences, however good the results. And at what point should you cease to treat the old body? Is it morally right to try to push off death by pursuing the development of drugs to excite the forgetful old mind and to activate the old body, knowing that it is designed to die? You cannot ask doctors or scientists to decide, because so long as they can see the technical opportunities, they will feel bound to give them a try on the principle that while there’s a life, there’s hope.