More than 200 people with diabetes injured after software issue drained insulin pump batteries | CNN

bananafrizz@kbin.run to World News@lemmy.world – 290 points –
More than 200 people with diabetes injured after software issue drained insulin pump batteries | CNN
edition.cnn.com

More than 200 people with diabetes have been injured when their insulin pumps shut down unexpectedly due to a problem with a connected mobile app, the US Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday.

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I hope not.

First: You can't avoid bugs. You simply can not.

Second: There aren't that many producers of good insulin pumps and the t:slim is a great device.

Yeah, it’s probably one of the best out there. I don’t love that with their newest pump it’s 100% phone controlled (literally no screen on the device) but there is no way in fuck I am ever trying a Medtronic pump again. Had one for a day because my insurance wouldn’t cover a new tandem pump. It was such a piece of shit

The fact that an app big drains the pump and no fail safes monitor for example the battery drain on the pump itself.. hey this pump is using more battery than it should.. battery will be flat in x hours.

Next time it will inject too much or too little insulin and then?

Avoiding bugs by doing proper QA and building in double and triple checks is the name of the game, not being faultless.

Yeah, I get the sentiment that you can't avoid bugs and I think to an extent they are inevitable at a certain point. But something like this is just negligence.

My company isn't medical or anything life threatening if something goes wrong, but a bug could cost someone a nice heap of money, in turn costing us a nice heap of money. So we have a rule to treat and test our software as if it were used in the medical industry. Although it seems like we should be aiming for a higher standard at this point.

and no fail safes monitor for example the battery drain on the pump itself.. hey this pump is using more battery than it should

Yeah, that was a failure. But wishing a company to be "sued into oblivion" is a tiny little bit overreacting, isn't it?

Next time it will inject too much or too little insulin and then?

How about to just move on and get yourself a model from a different company, if you don't trust them anymore instead of assuming stuff.

Why is it an overreaction? The only language a company speaks is money. So the risk of not doing proper QA and safety precautions should be the shareholders losing their shirt.

Because if this is not the risk, the cost benefit analysis leans towards "fuck the lives of our customers".

If an individual caused this kind of harm to others through negligence they would never see the outside of a prison even again. So why does a group of individuals shielded behind a company get punished less? If the punishment is just a fine, it is not really a crime, is it?

And about moving on, I care about all the people that have one of these things or will get one in the future. The whole "Caveat Emptor" you seem to be preaching does not fly well with me as it exposes many vulnerable people to high risks.