The American Psychiatric Association (2001) report repeats the claim, made for decades, that the ECT death rate is about the same as that associated with general anaesthesia for minor surgery (which has been estimated at one per 13,000; Lagasse, 2002). This ignores the fact that even if this were true for an individual ECT treatment, the risk to each ECT recipient is likely to be much greater than that of minor surgery because they receive multiple treatments (eight on average). Paradoxically, it is precisely this risk that is referred to by those arguing that repeated general anaesthesia is too dangerous to warrant the use of SECT as a control.