Scientology's emphasis on the group over the individual can make it difficult to stay alive.  In fact, they like it that way.

REINCARNATION is a central tenant of the cult because it cheapens life right now.  "Let's just work these people to death and it won't matter because if they die they will just reincarnate instantly and come back to work for us when they are old enough."  This is why the Sea Org, their priest class, signs a billion year contract.  They are expected to serve Scientology, die, return, serve Scientology, die, and return about 25 million times until they have served the billion years they signed up for. After that I suppose they get a break. Despite their belief in reincarnation no one has appeared on their doorstep saying they were here to return to serve Scientology for a second lifetime.

SMOKING is encouraged in Scientology because founder L. Ron Hubbard chain smoked Kool cigarettes.  And I mean really chain smoked. He chain smoked so much that he ended up basing the logo for the Church of Spiritual Technology, Scientology's highest organization, on the Kool logo.  This logo was eventually gouged into the earth to identify Scientology sacred property from space.  After he died Scientology buildings around the globe built offices for Hubbard to use when he reincarnates and comes back. They placed a pack of Kools on the desk to make him feel at home.  Later, after smoking became unKool the packs were removed.  The offices remain.  This guy has an office so much better than yours, and he's got gobs of them all over the globe.  And he hasn't reincarnated yet to use even one of them!

But in Scientology smoking is, was and always will be Kool.  They smoke all the time and all over the place.  Especially the middle aged drones.  One of their main locations is a former hospital in Los Angeles, Big Blue.  It is surrounded by medical facilities.  During a large protest there around 2009 a doctor on his way to work walked by.  He told me "I keep getting Scientologists who put their faith in religion coming to me with advanced lung cancer when it's too late for my science to help."  At Anonymous protests in Canada pranksters were delighted to discover Scientologists outside an org smoking. The cultists ran inside when the rebels appeared.  Then the protesters hid and the cultists came out again to desperately get some smoking breaks in.  Then the protesters came back shouting sacred words and the cultists ran inside again.  They were torn between getting their fix of nicotine  and their fear of getting pneumonia from hearing the sacred texts that were being shouted at them.  I can't tell you how many times I have seen smoking, suspicious looking people and I ask them "Are you a Sci?"  They ALWAYS answer "NO" which means "YES". At that point I say "You're not? That's funny, you smoke like a Scientologist."  Then they reveal themselves to be Scientologists by what they do or say. It's a comic script I've played out lots of times.

But lung cancer is not funny. And I'm a pothead!

LACK OF BASIC CARE happens to Sea Orgers a lot.  Because they are paid, at best, $50 a week they qualify for free medical care from the federal government.  Assuming they can leave their post to get in line for it.  Scientology is incredibly rich but makes sure its workers get welfare-state medical care, if any, and your taxes pay for it.   Compare this to the Catholic Church.  That organization runs many hospitals which provide free, quality scientific medical care for their nuns and priests. 

If a female Sea Org worker gets pregnant she is socially pressured to abort. Her friends, relatives and co-workers in the cult bubble are told to convince her to do it.  If she says "yes" she is given a cover story of lies and taken to Planned Parenthood.  They foot the bill.  If she wants to say "no" she has to flee as the daughter-in-law of cult uber-lawyer Kendrick Moxon did.

SICKNESS IS YOUR FAULT because they believe that getting sick is a sign of weakness, of being not in control of your environment (MEST).  Even a car crash is considered your fault because you should have gone back in time on the "whole track" to before the accident and then prevented it.  People with flaws like epilepsy, AIDS or obesity are considered in a "lower condition" and inferior.  This philosophy causes people to work when they are sick and cover up infections out of shame, potentially spreading them.  Human flaws like wearing glasses are looked on as a failure to Keep Scientology Working.  In reality, people's weaknesses are being exploited to motivate followers using guilt.

UNSAFE WORK CONDITIONS are common because Scientology believes that people are cheap and safety codes don't apply to them. They are superior and don't really need to answer to a government or an outside force.   I've personally observed cultists on Hollywood Boulevard building their Winter Wonderland set without wearing hardhats, using lifts as cranes and working in the middle of the night.  Other protesters once came upon a welder at Big Blue welding inside the building at 10 PM.  When cultists saw that protesters were watching him they shut the windows and pulled the blinds down.  This left the poor guy to weld in an unventilated space.  During an early 2008 protest at the same location cultists violated hospital noise laws with a giant speaker system to drown out protester's shouts.  Cultists who were especially loyal were rewarded with standing next to the giant speakers for long periods and having their inner ears destroyed.  All in the name of solidarity against the protesting masses of Anonymous.

CHOOSING HUBBARD OVER A DOCTOR is a sign of loyalty.  Protester Tory Magoo (in video at right) was told that epilepsy is a psychosomatic illness and that she should stop taking her epilepsy meds.  She had horrible seizures. Her Mother called her and said: "They're going to kill you, Tory, and IF you're not back on your medication TODAY--and your Doctor calls and tells me you aren't, I will personally fly out and trust me, L Ron Hubbard and Scientology will NEVER forget your Mother". She then went back onto her medication to control seizures and has been seizure free. Protester Happy Smurf was told to stop taking his AIDS medication and his viral load went up.  He went back on his meds.  This was supposed to make them feel guilty and try even harder to make Scientology Work. 

If they had done better at Scientology they would not need any other medical care. Eventually members have gone so high up in the org that choosing non-Scientology doctors is a sign of disloyalty.  And Scientology approved doctors are often the quacks that treated Lisa McPherson and left her dead.  There are endless examples of people choosing Hubbard over hospitals or going off all their psych meds. The results are always awful.