President's Report by Ben Best
 
This issue of LONG LIFE should reach Members soon enough to remind them that the Cryonics Institute Annual General Meeting (CI AGM) will be Sunday, September 23 and an informal social dinner will be held the preceding evening. Most CI Members do not get much chance to relate to like-minded people during their normal daily lives.

Attending one or both events provides an exceptional opportunity to meet CI Members and learn about CI -- an opportunity that comes only once per year.

The meeting and social are open to the public, so guests are very welcome. If interested call CI at
(586) 791-5961 or send e-mail to CIHQ@aol.com.
 
In August the CI Board of Directors formally approved a motion that CI Members who have fully pre-paid their human cryopreservation fees ($28,000 Option One or $35,000 Option Two) will be exempt from any future human cryopreservation price increases as long as the pre-payment amount is at least as much as the cryopreservation price at the time they made the payment in full.

Otherwise, CI has no policy of fixed prices. If prices are increased in the future there is no policy of "grandfathering" Members at the old prices, so Members without other financial means could find themselves unable to afford their cryopreservation. Pre-payment is also the most fail-safe means of funding, safe from problems that could cause delays at the time of legal death if there are questions about the funding.
 
All CI Members who currently have funding and contracts in place for human cryopreservation have been mailed statements asking the Members if they want their body perfused. Body perfusion cannot currently vitrify, so the best it can do is reduce ice formation. It is also our belief that with current technology that body perfusion compromises the quality of brain perfusion, although we are making efforts to reduce the harm. Nonetheless, we want to give CI Members the option of body perfusion if they feel strongly that this is something they want. Members also have the option of leaving the decision to CI, based on our best judgment of the benefits and harms to the patient in light of existing technology.
 
The influx of new patients for 2007 has continued for another two months -- adding one new patient approximately every month. This issue of LONG LIFE reports on CI patients #82 and #83.
 
CI now has a more secure computer-controlled cooling system for efficiently cooling our patients to liquid nitrogen temperature. The most recent upgrade includes an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) connected to the controller software in such a way that an alarm will sound if a power outage occurs and the system becomes dependent upon the UPS. Additionally, a list of phone numbers are dialed repeatedly giving the warning that there has been a power failure causing system operation to be dependent upon the UPS. The UPS can supply power for nearly an hour, during which time there would be time to get a generator running. Power outages are not too frequent, but they do happen, and could happen in the middle of the night -- so this offers security against an outage seriously compromising patient cooling.
 
The long struggle of the Cryonics Institute to become a tax-exempt 501(c)13 cemetery continues.
The Internal Revenue Service has declined another appeal on the grounds that CI is not really a cemetery. CI Directors are not willing to give up and the basis for our next appeal is under investigation.
 
TV journalists descended upon us again in July, one team from Spain and one team from South Korea. The South Koreans were particularly aggressive in wanting to interview CI Members at the CI Facility and in their homes. The help provided by CI Members living close to the CI Facility was greatly appreciated. Based on past experience, however, we are not expecting a huge influx of new Members from Spain or South Korea.
 
A year ago on the CI Members' forum Marta Sandberg raised concern about the danger of a possible takeover of CI by con men trying to get the assets. Robert Ettinger replied to her on the forum, discounting the danger she raised, but expressing concern that the By-Laws can be changed by two-thirds of Voting Members attending a meeting. The issue was discussed at the 2006 AGM where I unsuccessfully tried to eliminate this problem. In the last issue of LONG LIFE I announced that proxies would be mailed to repeal Section V-A (5.01) of the By-Laws to prevent a small group of Voting Members at a meeting from changing corporate policy. A month after that issue of LONG LIFE was mailed, the proxies were mailed.
Subsequently, Immortalist Society President York Porter began raising questions about issues associated with the proxy. It is now clear that the repeal of V-A leaves much to be desired and that more modifications of the By-Laws will be required. In my opinion every proposed change of By-Laws or corporate policy should first be approved by a majority of CI Directors and then approved by a quorum of two-thirds of CI Voting Members who have been sent proxies. In the short term (within the span of a few years) it is doubtful that the repeal or non-repeal of Section V-A will be of much consequence. The best thing that can be said about the proxy vote for Section V-A is that it provoked some good thoughtful discussion that should lead to good By-Law changes in the near future.

NEWS & VIEWS

The Cryonics Institute has accepted its 49th pet for cryopreservation: the cat of Dayna Dye. Dayna has been an employee of the Life Extension Foundation for decades and has been a cryonicist for decades. This was the third cat that Dayna has placed into storage at the Cryonics Institute. The cat was dying of cancer and Dayna faced the inevitable by having the cat injected with heparin before being euthanized.

CI's Research Director Dr. Yuri Pichugin perfused the cat's brain using the CI-VM-1 vitrification protocol before perfusing the body with glycerol (10%, then 30%, then 75% glycerol). This may be the best approach for providing body perfusion for our human patients, in addition to vitrifying the brain.

CAT HAS UNCANNY ABILITY

Oscar, a feline resident of a Providence Rhode Island nursing home "predicts" patients death by laying next to them in their final hours.

His accuracy, confirmed in twenty-five cases, has led staff to call family members once he has chosen someone. According to the staff, many patients are so ill, they don’t know the cat is there. However, many family members are consoled, knowing that a cat is providing companionship. Oscar was adopted as a kitten, and grew up in the dementia unit of the nursing home. Adapted from FLORIDA TODAY

Since this story was published, there have been a number of reports from across the country of cats with similar ability.

"ASK ME ABOUT CRYONICS"

John de Rivaz has opened an online shop selling a number of items of merchandise that contain the message "ask me about cryonics"

http://shop.cryonics-europe.org


There are large and small lapel buttons as well as other items. If an outgoing person willing to discuss cryonics wears such a button, then people can be free to ask or not as they chose.

The idea comes from opticians who are told not to push contact lenses to their spectacle customers -- staff carry badges saying "ask me about contact lenses". Similar badges about cryonics are the basis of this shop.

All the items at this shop are priced at cost, ie the only profits made are by the people running the drop shippers. The buttons come in large or small sizes, and can be ordered in lots of 10 or 100 as well as singly. I would emphasize that I get no money from sales, and therefore there is no reason why a cryonics group should not buy 10 or 100 and distribute them to their members willing to wear them.