Chinese Democracy

Could local Falun Gong allegations of organ harvesting become a thorn in Beijing's Olympic crown?

When Jeff Kline's mother was diagnosed with end-stage liver cancer in 2003, doctors told her there was nothing they could do. There wasn't time for conventional treatments, and her age and type of cancer made her ineligible for a transplant. At 59, with no hope of getting a new liver, she was given less than two months to live.

But in the course of his work developing Web sites for nonprofits in Philadelphia, Kline came across a human-rights organization that described allegations of organ harvesting in China. Ironically, that site offered Kline hope. Desperate and curious, he went to Beijing, where a hospital initially rejected his plea for an organ donation because he was a foreigner. He returned to the U.S., started the online search anew and found a Taiwanese man with whom he arranged a meeting in Shanghai. The man worked for an official company that arranged transplants in China for people in Taiwan.

Three weeks later, after signing contracts, taking out a mortgage on the house to cover the $100,000 fee, and sending her overseas to a Shanghai hospital, Kline's mother had a new, functioning liver.

"After my mother's transplant, I went in chat rooms to talk to people about it," says Kline*. "I started receiving hate e-mails accusing me of 'complicity in murder.'"

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=bodybrokers
FR Keyword Search: body brokers

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1602444/posts
Japan Organ Transplant Network

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1602444/posts?page=8#8
Shared research and grant funding shows relations between Liaoning Provincial Thrombosis Hospital with Robert Wood Johnson, Monsanto, University of Cambridge, Rockefeller Foundation and Fannie Mae

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1742423/posts?page=15#15
German newspaper Der Spiegel reported that some bodies used by “Body Worlds,” which is not affiliated with the Seattle exhibition, used executed Chinese prisoners. German investigators, however, found no evidence to support those allegations.

All cadavers used for “Bodies” were legally obtained, and those of Chinese people — many of whom died from disease or natural causes — who were either unknown or had no families to claim their bodies when they died, Glover said.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1742423/posts
...China has acknowledged that most of the human organs used in transplants here are taken from executed prisoners and that many of the recipients are foreigners who pay hefty sums to avoid a long wait.....China doesn’t disclose the number of annual executions, Amnesty International says at least 1,770 people were put to death in 2005, based on a review of Chinese media reports. Some activists say the annual figure could be as high as 10,000....

Little did Kline, a social activist against the death penalty, know that the decision landed him in the middle of a growing international issue: Protestors across the globe claim the Chinese government has targeted members of dissident groups for arrest and, in some cases, execution, after which their organs allegedly have been harvested for transplants.
hile Jeff Kline now acknowledges that the liver he found for his mother was likely harvested from an executed prisoner, he feels that if someone were executed solely to provide a liver for his mother, it would have been available immediately. Instead, it took doctors three weeks to locate an organ during which time his mother almost died.
His Taiwanese broker told him that sometimes people wait for months and die before an organ becomes available; this is still considered relatively short, given that in the U.S. and other Western countries, the recipients often wait for several years.
In China, Kline noted that there are cycles of availability, which may correspond to when the state conducts executions. Doctors told Kline that the date of execution was set in advance by courts to prevent hospitals from influencing when people are being killed. Hospitals find out about executions only three days in advance, during which time they do blood tests and obtain consent forms.
"The doctors did not hide the source of the organs," says Kline of an openness that made it easier for him to entrust them with his mother's life. But to him, the issue goes beyond Falun Gong's accusations. Organ donations should be the norm. "All organs should be available for donations and no one should be able to opt out, except maybe in the case of extreme religious belief. Why should people or their families necessarily get to determine what happens to their bodies when they die? There are already limits. You can't keep Grandma in the living room. What gives you or me the right to destroy our organs when they can save a life?"
Still, buying a liver in China was a last resort, after already waiting several years and visiting six transplant centers in the U.S. Instead, Kline's mother was given an extra year with her family, time that Kline will forever appreciate as the only way his mother would have been able to get to know her grandchildren.

"Some people ask me, 'How could you go?'" Kline says. "The doctors assured me that the prisoners gave consent; they produced a consent form in Chinese. Maybe the prisoners give consent because they give money to their families. ... If I knew that prisoners were being executed for their organs, I would never have done it."

Kline is anti-death penalty. I guess this only applies to common criminals. He's fine with the killing of political prisoners - as long as they're in places like China. What a major league douche bag.

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