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For decades, surgery was performed on infants without anesthesia because they were believed not to be conscious.

Probably something to do with the way we tend not to retain memories from before about 2 y/o.

And yes, obviously absurd, one would think. Yet something that it’s important for modern medicine to have evidence of.

> For decades, surgery was performed on infants without anesthesia

What hasn't yet been processed is the horror and barbarity of having done so. To this day, when it's mentioned, we can't take in what it means.

When the practice was discontinued (around 1984 IIRC), the NYT reported on the change much as if a style guide for medical reports had just been revised. (Sorry I don't have the link handy.)

Edit: I found https://web.archive.org/web/20090410072646/https://www.nytim... from 1987, but that one is an op-ed that actually does express some feeling (despite its obligatory "They did so for the purest of reasons" at the start). The report I was remembering, or perhaps misremembering, was devoid of that.

Yes, it's good that the science exists. But framing an obviously true fact - one which underpins so much of our morality - as up for debate (as the headline does), is caustic.

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