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Dying is easy. We do it every day. Letting go is the hard part.

A family is taking the extraordinary step of having their son flown to Israel because they won’t accept a diagnosis of “brain death” and the prospect that he’ll never improve or live without a breathing machine — that, in effect, he is no longer alive.

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Idan Azrad, 27, was critically injured while cycling along Renaud Road in Orléans on Aug. 7, suffering severe trauma to his head. Within about 48 hours, according to the family, doctors at The Ottawa Hospital reported he had no brain activity.

The immediate family, with members in Ottawa and Israel, crossed continents to gather at his side, only to discover there was virtually nothing, medically, that could be done to help a young man in the prime of his life.

But they weren’t ready to entertain discussion of “pulling the plug” on the respirator. And a funny thing happened in the intervening week. His skin colour improved, his cuts and bruises began to heal. He looks, said sister-in-law Brittany Lepp, like he’s sleeping peacefully.