This is scary and should make us seriously think about what we are doing or have done to people in these situation, like Terri Schiavo. Brain scans can only tell so much and doctors are not mind readers. Unless the person is completely brain dead (i.e. a ventilator is literally the only thing keeping them alive) then the best bet is to err on the side of life. Human life has intrinsic value and worth no matter what we are able to do, even if we aren’t able to do anything.

Cindy thought her husband was blinking at her in response to her questions. The doctors thought those blinks were just reflexes, but they were wrong.

Five years later, Steve can recall everything that happened around his hospital bed.

“One of them said, ‘He’s nothing but a vegetable,'” he said

Steve has painstakingly learned to speak again. Now he calls himself “a thinking vegetable” as a joke.