Ryan Bridge: We're all living much longer - but at what cost?

We're all living much longer, aren't we? At what cost? That's my question for you this morning.

A report out over the weekend found human life expectancy has just about peaked globally.

It's lights out. Goodbye.

New Zealand men, you'll make 80, women, you'll make 83, which is great, longer life. Everyone wants one right now.

We're told that we also have a health system in crisis.

People waiting in waiting rooms, they can't afford to see a GP. Over the weekend, I read about a family man, a carpenter from Westport who was sent home, hours later he was dead.

In Rotorua a month ago, remember a man died in the waiting room at the emergency department while waiting.

So we don't have enough resources for health or we're not optimising the resources that we do have to meet the needs and we're being overwhelmed by them.

We have a huge aging population, the number of people 65 and over which was around 700,000 a few years back, that will quadruple by mid-2024. The number of people 90 over 31,000 that will quadruple in 20 years.

So, we'll have 125,000 90 plus year olds in New Zealand.

Now, if you're a doctor, you've got two people, both as sick as each other, one's 40 one's 90. One might die if you treat the other first.

What do you do? Serious question?

I mean, to me, the obvious answer is one person has had 90 years on this planet.

You treat the young one first, don't you, because the older ones had more life to live.

Am I saying let's stop treating patients based on need and discriminate against the elderly? No, because I love my grandmother.

We have to do it on who's sickest, who's closer to death, all that sort of stuff. But I am curious, for those who work in healthcare, is there a touch of bias on who you might treat first?

I know you've got the Hippocratic Oath, et cetera, but if you're presented with a situation like that, how do you respond to it?

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