Helen Salisbury: Death—the great leveller?

Ideas of what counts as a good death are probably quite varied, but most would agree that it should occur in old age and with minimum suffering. Roger McGough famously asked for a young man’s death in his poem, describing (among other possibilities) revenge from a jealous lover at the age of 104.1 I had a family friend who died at 84 while playing tennis—still with full use of his limbs, eyes, and brain and, right up until the final moment, still actively engaged and in good company.But sudden stops are hard on the people left behind, so perhaps, given the choice, we’d opt for a brief but painless illness, allowing time to gather the people we loved around us and say goodbye, with a chance for those last conversations that survivors often regret not having.As a GP I’ve been lucky to witness some good and gentle deaths. I particularly…
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