system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[Mass Effect] Do the reapers turn living organisms into Husks or do they only convert dead bodies into Husks?
gpt
If the person isn't dead when they're first impaled on the spikes (or "dragon's teeth" as the Alliance military calls them), the process that converts their tissues into cybernetic components certainly kills them. 

I doubt they particularly care if they put a living being or a corpse on a spike. The body just has to be intact enough for the husk to be a viable addition to the reaper ground forces.