My understanding is that the problem with the gas mask is not oxygen, but rather it’s so small that CO2 builds up, so the prisoner feels that they are suffocating.
A problem that has been solved for respirators meant for breathing, including in space when you don’t want to just expel the air to the surrounding environment. If it’s ok to expel it to the environment, the technology is as simple as a rubber flap over a hole in the mask.
Though reading more about it, there are mechanisms that could still cause distress even if the mask is designed to expel CO2 properly, including CO2 poisoning because the body’s ability to expel it can be compromised by the lack of oxygen. And it’s possible that executionees experience inert gas asphyxiation differently from accidental victims because they are aware of what’s happening while accidental victims might pass out without ever realizing they were dying, which can affect the way the body uses resources.
The norm in the US – lethal injection – is apparently to essentially knock someone out, then stop their heart. I don’t imagine that one feels anything.
In most states, the intravenous injection is a series of drugs given in a set sequence, designed to first induce unconsciousness followed by death through paralysis of respiratory muscles and/or by cardiac arrest through depolarization of cardiac muscle cells. The execution of the condemned in most states involves three separate injections (in sequential order):
Sodium thiopental or pentobarbital: ultra-short-action barbiturate, an anesthetic agent used at a high dose that renders the person unconscious in less than 30 seconds. Depression of respiratory activity is one of the characteristic actions of this drug. Consequently, the lethal-injection doses, as described in the Sodium Thiopental section below, will—even in the absence of the following two drugs—cause death due to lack of breathing, as happens with overdoses of opioids.
Pancuronium bromide: non-depolarizing muscle relaxant, which causes complete, fast, and sustained paralysis of the striated skeletal muscles, including the diaphragm and the rest of the respiratory muscles; this would eventually cause death by asphyxiation.
Potassium chloride: a potassium salt, which increases the blood and cardiac concentration of potassium to stop the heart via an abnormal heartbeat and thus cause death by cardiac arrest.
The problem with that is dosages. First drug knocks you out, second drug paralyzes you, third drug stops your heart.
But if you fuck up the dosages, the first drug wears off while the second drug is still in effect. So you are awake but paralyzed and can’t move, so nobody knows you are awake. That leaves you conscious while your heart dies which is quite painful.
The companies that make the drugs used to perform lethal injection have refused to participate in the death penalty any longer which is why other forms are being explored.
I fully support drug companies not wanting their medications to be used to kill people. On the other hand, we give our dogs and cats painless deaths with their drugs and, if we’re going to be killing people, they deserve the same dignity.
The drug companies didn’t exactly decide to step away from the death penalty fully on their own initiative. They were threatened with criminal prosecutions in Europe for abetting executions in the United States.
Don’t they have bullets? Gassing people seems very cruel and unusual. Being shot is not unusual.
I’m not pro-death penalty, but if it’s going to be done at least get the shit right.
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They don’t. They put a gas mask on the prisoner, which lets oxygen in, rather than putting them in an airtight chamber.
My understanding is that the problem with the gas mask is not oxygen, but rather it’s so small that CO2 builds up, so the prisoner feels that they are suffocating.
A problem that has been solved for respirators meant for breathing, including in space when you don’t want to just expel the air to the surrounding environment. If it’s ok to expel it to the environment, the technology is as simple as a rubber flap over a hole in the mask.
Though reading more about it, there are mechanisms that could still cause distress even if the mask is designed to expel CO2 properly, including CO2 poisoning because the body’s ability to expel it can be compromised by the lack of oxygen. And it’s possible that executionees experience inert gas asphyxiation differently from accidental victims because they are aware of what’s happening while accidental victims might pass out without ever realizing they were dying, which can affect the way the body uses resources.
I always wondered why they don’t just drain their blood until they die. Seems like the most painless and easiest way to do it.
The norm in the US – lethal injection – is apparently to essentially knock someone out, then stop their heart. I don’t imagine that one feels anything.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lethal_injection
The problem with that is dosages. First drug knocks you out, second drug paralyzes you, third drug stops your heart. But if you fuck up the dosages, the first drug wears off while the second drug is still in effect. So you are awake but paralyzed and can’t move, so nobody knows you are awake. That leaves you conscious while your heart dies which is quite painful.
The companies that make the drugs used to perform lethal injection have refused to participate in the death penalty any longer which is why other forms are being explored.
I fully support drug companies not wanting their medications to be used to kill people. On the other hand, we give our dogs and cats painless deaths with their drugs and, if we’re going to be killing people, they deserve the same dignity.
I agree…. If it’s their choice. Not as punishment
The drug companies didn’t exactly decide to step away from the death penalty fully on their own initiative. They were threatened with criminal prosecutions in Europe for abetting executions in the United States.