Can you consider dead, person with respiratory ventilators after declaring they are brain dead?

The exact definition of "death" varies depending on state law. Typically, if doctors can prove there is no brain activity, they can pronounce a person "dead" even though the person is on a ventilator and has a beating heart. This allows the 'body' to be maintained in a "lifelike" state to keep organs 'alive' to be used for transplant.

Some people believe the point of death is when the heart actually stops beating. With today's technology, a person's heart can be kept beating and blood pressure maintained nearly indefinitely despite the fact that their brain activity has ceased. This is accomplished with medications and artificial respiration (ventilators). Therefore, such a person could be kept "alive" for great lenghts of time, even though there is absolutely no hope of them ever coming out of a coma, or ever functioning normally again. That's why many, probably most, states have allowed doctors to declare death in someone that has flat EEG's and no signs of brain activity, even deep subconscious reflexes.

There are other lines of belief that say death occurs when the "spirit" leaves the body. However, since there is no way to quantitatively measure when that occurs, it is not used medically to determine death.

For all intents and purposes, a person can be declared dead if there is 1) no heart activity/blood pressure/respirations OR 2)no brain activity IN THE ABSENCE OF NEUROLOGIC MEDICATIONS despite a beating heart.