Although death from pneumonia is often referred to as ‘the old person’s friend’, a death from a COVID pneumonia is far from friendly. The original pneumonia reference cones from the 1899 edition of William Osler’s famous text, Principle and Practice of Modern Medicine.
In this landmark book, Osler describes a pneumonic death as being ‘taken off by it in an acute, short, not often painful illness, the old man [sic] escapes those “cold gradations of decay” so distressing to himself and his friends.’
It is important to note that Osler was referring to a time before antibiotics and before artificial ventilation had been invented. He was referring to a time when lung infections were commonly bacterial, and the resultant death did, indeed, allow one to escape the ‘cold gradations of decay’!
With COVID viral pneumonia, however, one struggles to breathe as one tries to suck air into one’s water-logged lungs. The person will also experience the unpleasant effects of accumulating carbon dioxide. The mildly-euphoric effects of cerebral hypoxia (associated with the ‘old person’s friend’) will