Spirit Child (broadcast edition) + Beyond Coma (podcast and Radio Australia edition)Spirit Child (broadcast edition) + Beyond Coma (podcast and Radio Australia edition)
All In The Mind
An unusual behaviour, an enlarged head, a limp, or a superb musical talent -- ability, disability or difference? In Northern Ghana, disabled children labelled as evil 'Spirit Children' are killed. Acclaimed African BBC reporter Sorious Samura reports. For copyright reasons, this week's podcast and online edition is an alternative from our archives, Beyond Coma: The Plight of the Persistant Vegetative State.
30:41•2 May 2009
Beyond Coma: Consciousness, Misdiagnosis and Lives on Hold
Episode Overview
- Persistent vegetative state (post-coma unresponsiveness) is difficult to diagnose and may be misdiagnosed in a significant proportion of cases.
- fMRI scans can reveal hidden awareness in a small number of patients who show no behavioural responses, challenging assumptions about their inner lives.
- Legal cases such as Northridge highlight the need for clearer diagnostic guidelines and fair processes when families and clinicians disagree on treatment.
- New terminology and ethical frameworks aim to reduce stigma and focus on patients’ best interests, even when prognosis is uncertain.
- Emerging brain–computer approaches could one day allow yes/no communication, but they also raise worries about privacy, consent and overhyping the science.
“You can tell her family she's awake.”
What can we learn from those who have battled addiction? Here, the focus widens from substances to consciousness itself, asking what it really means to be present, aware and treated as a person. All In The Mind keeps its trademark mix of science, storytelling and ethical argument, with Natasha Mitchell guiding a calm yet vivid conversation. The broadcast mention of Ghanaian “Spirit Children” sets a stark context: how societies judge difference and decide whose life counts.
The podcast edition then shifts to “Beyond Coma”, looking at people in a persistent vegetative state (now called post-coma unresponsiveness in Australia) and the huge medical, legal and emotional questions around them.
You’ll hear a chillingly beautiful reading from Kate Cole-Adams’ novel about waking from coma: “I woke into the dark and I thought I was dead.” It’s followed by neuroscientist Dr Adrian Owen describing how a young woman, diagnosed as vegetative, could respond in an fMRI scanner simply by imagining playing tennis on cue. As he puts it, this was “an amazing result”, showing she understood language and could follow instructions despite appearing unresponsive.
Law professor Cameron Stewart unpacks a key Australian court case where a diagnosis was challenged, explaining why terms like “vegetative state” are being phased out and why the law still circles around one tough test: what is in a patient’s best interests? Dr Martin Monti then explains how imagining tennis versus walking through your house could be turned into a yes/no code, raising both hope and unease about “brain reading”.
This episode suits anyone curious about consciousness, brain injury, ethics at the edge of life and how families cope when a body survives but the mind is uncertain. It’s serious, sometimes unsettling, but delivered with clarity, humanity and the odd wry moment. What would you want your loved ones to know about your wishes if life ever hung in this kind of balance?
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