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FakeBeldin [soylentnews.org] writes:

Surgery [theguardian.com] to embed a nerve stimulating implant in a patient in a persistent vegetative state (15 years), resulted in the patient reverting to a "minimally conscious" state.

Stimulation of the vagus nerve allows patient who had been in a persistant vegetative state for 15 years to track objects with his eyes and respond to simple requests .

Note that "respond" is on the level of "turning his head when asked, though that took a minute."

A few thoughts on this:
- Medical advances are COOL!
    Hopefully, this advance can help some folks.
- This makes ethical questions concerning patients in persistent vegetative states more urgent :s
      (e.g. the question of whether/when to pull the plug has become even more confusing)
- This introduces some new ethical questions:
      is it ethical to bring back someone after 15 years? (the world has changed quite significantly)
      Is it ethical to "bring back" someone to a state where they're might just barely be conscious enough to realise how much
      their state sucks?

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