The Living Dead

Whilst out shopping recently I came across quite a few examples of what I believe to be a pretty new species of old human beings.

This species is 'The Living Dead'.

'Zombies', if you like.

'Walking Corpses' also sadly springs to mind.

These people have been saved by and are at the same time the victims of medical science.

I'm not being nasty (well I suppose that I am) but there are so many old people out and about nowadays (and MANY more behind closed doors) who look, and move, like zombies.

Medical science has kept them alive way past the stage that their bodies have given up, but the most ghastly aspect of all of this is that medical science of the body far outstrips medical science of the mind.

And of course what this means is that people's bodies survive (just), enough to go out and move around (slowly) but the brains are fucked!

They shuffle about here and there hardly remembering why they came out of the house and oblivious to all those around them as they block up supermarket isles and the like.

I'm not making fun of these people nor do they annoy me - I feel for them - but I wonder what, for example, awaits me - and my children for that matter.

Will medical science keep us alive for hundreds of years with the body working (just) but with the brain having turned to confused and terrified mush years ago.

This is why I believe there is so much Alzheimer's and dementia - because people are being kept alive longer than their natural lifespan, and of course the body keeps on going but the brain packs up.

I'm not arguing for euthanasia, but just reflecting on a scary and increasingly more common phenomenon that I see around me all of the time.