Value of Life

I went to work yesterday to help out a friend who had a head injury following an assault. On getting to the hospital, imagine my surprise to see a man sprawled face up, half on the curb the rest on the road, with a lady evidently his relative, standing non-chalantly next to him. Having seen many alcoholics in similar positions and worse i took him to be just another drunkard.

But something didnt smell right. For one, the alco-ho's normally get picked up at night rarely during the day, and this guy was deathly quiet. Not moving or nothing. All this was going through my mind as i was getting my stuff out of the car and walking into our A & E. With my curiousity piqued.. i decided to give him a closer look.

I found a young, african male about 60 kgs. There was no pulse, no respiratory effort and the pupils were fixed and dilated. In short, the poor fellow was deceased. The surprising thing was that he was still warm, meaning he had JUST died, probably in the preceeding few minutes. And the relative was not even bothered when i explained to her what had just transpired. She went on staring into space. I helped get the body into A & E so that he could be logged in and taken to the mortuary.. which in itself in our setup, is a process and a half..

Anyway, it never fails to bother me how little life is valued in our part of the world. Is it that the death rate is so high? or is the value of life literally not as valuable as in a more prosperous country? maybe im too cynical, but seeing so many avoidable deaths can really jade your outlook.