My little brother used to wake at night wondering what would happen when he died, but I never did.

While he and my mother shared a fear of death, it didn't bother me and at 41 - never having peeked over that cliff edge - it still doesn't fill me with dread.

Every one of us will die, but it seems to me people have different attitudes to death.

As a society, however, I believe we are operating on the presumption that death is the worst fate and should be delayed at all costs.

I'm not advocating assisted suicide as an alternative here, although reading the response of Holyrood's Health and Sport committee to Margo MacDonald's bill on this subject is the reason its on my mind.

I agree with the committee - crucial elements of this proposed legislation were too woolly - but other findings made me angry. They said offering assisted suicide could potentially communicate "an offensive message to certain members of our community... that society would regard it as 'reasonable', rather than tragic, if they wished to end their lives."

This is offensive to assisted suicide campaigners, and takes as a given that death is the ultimate tragedy. But developing terminal cancer at a young age or living in a body that's degenerating uncontrollably are tragedies too.

What's more, as a society we treat some tragedies as if they were reasonable on a daily basis. Our obsession that death is the most tragic, is one reason they continue. I used to visit an elderly man every week who couldn't walk. He was kept in a small, upstairs room with what you might generously call a kitchenette.

He never went out. I would like to say his pleasures were his newspaper and the meals his almost equally frail neighbour cooked for him, but he would not have said that. One day he was admitted to hospital, and later, to the worst care home I've ever seen. When I visited it, I couldn't tell if he was confused or too depressed to talk.

I AM NOT SAYING THIS SUPPORTS ASSITED SUICIDE. I am saying we spend billions developing drugs that let people live a bit longer and demand the NHS buys them. I got a press release about another this week which adds a median of four months to life.

Meanwhile, the way we look after some vulnerable, elderly people is close to cruelty and care workers, who can make a big difference to quality of life, get little recognition and lousy pay.

Yet, any politician who promised to take some of the money we spend fighting death and use it to improve late life, would be attacked from all angles including the medical research lobby.

When we talk about death in the abstract it assumes a darkness, but while losing and missing someone is awful, death is not always black.

When someone is dying people often value other things above extra lifetime: Understanding what's happening, being listened to, having pain relief. This takes resources too.

We can keep spending billions developing new drugs, but we are fighting death at the expense of the living and sometimes the price is tragic.