Well no. While that does happen often. Failing to save someone isn’t causing their death.
In this specific case, they simply failed to save someone they could have. Nothing they did was the cause of this kids death.
The difference is, if the mother kept the kid home, it would have all played out the same.
When the healthcare system kills someone. They would have survived if they stayed home. Or at least died of something different.
That’s what they do. Some anyway.
Heart disease is still considered a leading cause of death. Or is it doctors not curing heart disease, that’s the leading cause now?
Failing to save someone’s life, implies they made decisions in an attempt to save the life. That they tried, and were unsuccessful.
But in this case, they made decisions which directly prevented Micah from receiving the tests that would have given them the opportunity to save his life.
The decision, and action, to dissuade Micah’s mother from seeking further medical care directly lead to his death. The decision, and action, to discharge him without adequate testing directly lead to his death.
The ER team on the third visit sounds to have tried and failed to save his life, even the decision to wait for blood thinners until more thorough testing was likely correct since they were most likely unaware of the risk of the formation of blood clots in the child.
The primary care doctor and the first ER team negligently made a series of decisions and actions that allowed a child to have an illness go undetected until it became fatal. They had the training and knowledge to know how serious the symptoms reported were and that the child’s recovery was not in line with the illness they had initially diagnosed him. They may have had procedures they didn’t follow which if they had would have prevented Micah death. If those are identified, then yes, I would say they caused his death through inaction.
Does it rise to criminality? No. But it’s likely malpractice.
Hypothetically, you’re a bridge inspector.
Someone reports a bridge in your area has problems and should be looked at.
It’s part of your job to inspect bridges that have reports filed.
You go “look at” the bridge but don’t inspect because “99% of reports are fake”.
The bridge collapses killing someone.
So you agree the doctors were useless in this case.
I agree they had no effect in this case.
They failed to serve their intended use. That may be worse than useless, because it comes with unfulfilled hope. Rather than offering no hope at all, with something that actually useless.
Inaction can be causative. For example, to simplify the scenario into the trolley problem, with one person on the current track, and no people on the other track, if you choose not to pull the lever, you have caused that person’s death.
Well no. While that does happen often. Failing to save someone isn’t causing their death.
In this specific case, they simply failed to save someone they could have. Nothing they did was the cause of this kids death.
The difference is, if the mother kept the kid home, it would have all played out the same.
When the healthcare system kills someone. They would have survived if they stayed home. Or at least died of something different.
How can you say this with a straight face. Their inaction caused this kid’s death. Inaction is a choice.
What about the illness? Was that not the cause?
Do tell me though, how could the illness get so bad?
That’s what they do. Some anyway.
Heart disease is still considered a leading cause of death. Or is it doctors not curing heart disease, that’s the leading cause now?
Failing to save someone’s life, implies they made decisions in an attempt to save the life. That they tried, and were unsuccessful.
But in this case, they made decisions which directly prevented Micah from receiving the tests that would have given them the opportunity to save his life.
The decision, and action, to dissuade Micah’s mother from seeking further medical care directly lead to his death. The decision, and action, to discharge him without adequate testing directly lead to his death.
The ER team on the third visit sounds to have tried and failed to save his life, even the decision to wait for blood thinners until more thorough testing was likely correct since they were most likely unaware of the risk of the formation of blood clots in the child.
The primary care doctor and the first ER team negligently made a series of decisions and actions that allowed a child to have an illness go undetected until it became fatal. They had the training and knowledge to know how serious the symptoms reported were and that the child’s recovery was not in line with the illness they had initially diagnosed him. They may have had procedures they didn’t follow which if they had would have prevented Micah death. If those are identified, then yes, I would say they caused his death through inaction.
Does it rise to criminality? No. But it’s likely malpractice.
It certainly is malpractice. They fucked up, and should be held accountable for those mistakes.
But if a person doesn’t stop something, they had no part in starting, it doesn’t make sense to say they “caused” the result.
It’s really just that simple.
Hypothetically, you’re a bridge inspector. Someone reports a bridge in your area has problems and should be looked at. It’s part of your job to inspect bridges that have reports filed. You go “look at” the bridge but don’t inspect because “99% of reports are fake”. The bridge collapses killing someone.
Did you cause the death?
No. You failed to prevent it.
Unless your job is to save them and doing your job right would have saved them, but you chose not to do your job right.
So you agree the doctors were useless in this case.
I agree they had no effect in this case.
They failed to serve their intended use. That may be worse than useless, because it comes with unfulfilled hope. Rather than offering no hope at all, with something that actually useless.
Inaction can be causative. For example, to simplify the scenario into the trolley problem, with one person on the current track, and no people on the other track, if you choose not to pull the lever, you have caused that person’s death.
I’m specifically saying that’s not true. You failed to prevent the death.
Even with the lever being a working break. You’d be correctly blamed for it. But you still didn’t cause it.
Failure to fulfill a “what if” scenario you imagined, doesn’t create a cause.