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New England Journal of Medicine: 'Brain Death' is not Death - Organ Donors are Alive
LifeSiteNews ^ | 8/14/08 | John-Henry Westen

Posted on 08/15/2008 5:32:34 AM PDT by wagglebee

BOSTON, August 14, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In an article that is sure to rock the world of organ donation, the highly respected New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) has backed up the objections of various pro-life groups, as well as some scientists and physicians, to certain types of organ donation which involve the removal of vital organs from patients believed to be dead. The problem, say the authors of the NEJM article, is that in many cases these patients may not be dead at all. 

Key experts in the medical field have, since its inception, considered the 1968 invention of 'brain death' and the more recent criteria of 'cardiac death' as unsupportable criteria for true death.  If it is true, however, that brain death and cardiac death are invalid as criteria for true death, it would make morally illicit vital organ donation, since such donation would in some cases result directly in the killing of the donor for the purpose of harvesting his organs. 

The two authors of the article in the NEJM, both proponents of organ donation, argue that "as an ethical requirement for organ donation, the dead donor rule has required unnecessary and unsupportable revisions of the definition of death."

The article was co-authored by Dr. Robert D. Truog, a professor of medical ethics and anesthesia (pediatrics) in the Departments of Anesthesia and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Division of Critical Care Medicine at Children's Hospital Boston and Dr. Franklin G. Miller, a faculty member in the Department of Bioethics, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD.

The many cases hitting the media of patients pronounced 'brain dead' and living to tell their stories have already led the public to question the notion of 'brain death'.  A recent case in France where a patient revived on the operating table as surgeons were about to remove his organs, is only the latest in a string of such events.  (see: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jun/08061308.html )

Troug and Miller, after admitting that the scientific literature does not support the criteria for 'brain death' and 'cardiac death' as being real death, suggest instead that ethicists should simply remove the requirement for dead donors.  "The uncomfortable conclusion to be drawn from this literature is that although it may be perfectly ethical to remove vital organs for transplantation from patients who satisfy the diagnostic criteria of brain death, the reason it is ethical cannot be that we are convinced they are really dead," they write.

Similarly they note that with 'cardiac death', "although it may be ethical to remove vital organs from these patients, we believe that the reason it is ethical cannot convincingly be that the donors are dead."  Troug and Miller suggest that, rather than insisting on dead donors, "ethical requirements of organ donation" should be looked at "in terms of valid informed consent under the limited conditions of devastating neurologic injury."

However, the dead donor criteria is precisely the thing that most moral ethicists agree makes it ethical to remove vital organs for transplant. Doing otherwise would constitute actively killing a person via removal of their vital organs. 

In his August 29, 2000 address to the 18th International Congress of the Transplantation Society, Pope John Paul II stressed: "vital organs which occur singly in the body can be removed only after death, that is from the body of someone who is certainly dead."  He added: "This requirement is self-evident, since to act otherwise would mean intentionally to cause the death of the donor in disposing of his organs." (see the full address here: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/speeches/2000... )

Now that a prominent medical journal has come out and stated that brain death and cardiac death are invalid criteria for true death, some are hoping that the Catholic Church, which has not issued a formal position on vital organ donation, will officially come out in opposition to the practice - a practice which takes place in many Catholic hospitals throughout the world.

"The setting out of these facts should by all rights lead to a cessation of complete removal of any vital organ at Catholic hospitals", said Dr. John Shea, medical consultant to LifeSiteNews.com, who has written extensively on the subject of organ donation.

See the article from the NEJM online here:
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/359/7/674?query=TOC



TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: healthcare; moralabsolutes; organdonation; prolife
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The two authors of the article in the NEJM, both proponents of organ donation, argue that "as an ethical requirement for organ donation, the dead donor rule has required unnecessary and unsupportable revisions of the definition of death."

The mainstream media will BURY this news.

1 posted on 08/15/2008 5:32:34 AM PDT by wagglebee
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To: cgk; Coleus; cpforlife.org; narses; 8mmMauser

Pro-Life Ping


2 posted on 08/15/2008 5:33:00 AM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: BykrBayb; floriduh voter; Lesforlife; Dante3

Ping


3 posted on 08/15/2008 5:33:28 AM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: 230FMJ; 50mm; 69ConvertibleFirebird; Aleighanne; Alexander Rubin; An American In Dairyland; ...
Moral Absolutes Ping!

Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.

FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
[ Add keyword moral absolutes to flag FR articles to this ping list ]


4 posted on 08/15/2008 5:34:40 AM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: wagglebee

5 posted on 08/15/2008 5:35:16 AM PDT by Red Badger (All that carbon in all that oil and coal was once in the atmosphere. We're just putting it back.....)
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To: wagglebee

Monty Python was WAY ahead of the curve on this one. They had a “Live Organ Donor Sketch” in the early 1970s...

“We’re here for your Liver”

“WHAT?”

“Your liver! You DID sign this organ doner card, didn’t you?”

etc. etc.


6 posted on 08/15/2008 5:38:40 AM PDT by WayneS (Respect the 2nd Amendment; Repeal the 16th)
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To: wagglebee
It is always interesting when science fiction become science fact.

Larry Niven wrote an entire series of SF novels about this.

7 posted on 08/15/2008 5:42:06 AM PDT by fireforeffect (A kind word and a 2x4, gets you more than just a kind word.)
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To: wagglebee
That's right! We've been saying that here FOR YEARS. I will not be an organ donor nor will I accept one. Although the organs are donated for "free", somebody dies and the profit margin is in the surgeries and all the sub chapter corporations we don't hear about.

China has holding cells underground full of healthy donors who aren't in lock step with the regime. Do we really want to keep euthanizing people for profit???????

8 posted on 08/15/2008 5:45:10 AM PDT by floriduh voter ( Florida's Governor Crist has roined Floriduh but he's having fun so what the hey?)
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To: Red Badger

Can someone post that picture of the Monty Python skit where the man is arguing over whether he’s dead?


9 posted on 08/15/2008 5:45:44 AM PDT by Steve0113 (Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. -A.L.)
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To: wagglebee

I have refused to be an organ donor, knowing that there are philosophers around who constantly redefine what it means to be a person, and how they don’t think disabled and comatose human beings are sentient, worthy of protection, etc.

These people teach hospital personnel who are apparently putting the lessons into practice.

If it were otherwise, I would be an organ donor, and I know others who feel the same way.

If we could trust the hospital staff to make sure people were really dead before they sliced them open, we might have alot more available organs.


10 posted on 08/15/2008 5:45:58 AM PDT by fetal heart beats by 21st day (Defending human life is not a federalist issue. It is the business of all of humanity.)
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To: wagglebee

I signed my organ donor card, and knowing that what is in this article may indeed be true, I will still remain a donor. I think it would be an extremely small number of cases where brain death occurs and yet somehow the patient would later regain consciousness.

Where this info is important is in cases where they want to take people off life support citing statistics saying they will never recover...that is different than being an informed organ donor.


11 posted on 08/15/2008 5:46:32 AM PDT by Bobalu (If you don't want people pointing out your flaws, maybe you should work on not having any)
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To: floriduh voter

I do believe that there IS an ethical method for organ donation, but we’re nowhere close to it now.

It looks like if we continue to do ETHICAL stem cell research and quit killing 3500 babies every day, organ donation may become a thing of the past anyway:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2062292/posts


12 posted on 08/15/2008 5:48:36 AM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: Steve0113

13 posted on 08/15/2008 5:48:56 AM PDT by Red Badger (All that carbon in all that oil and coal was once in the atmosphere. We're just putting it back.....)
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To: wagglebee
He's only mostly dead. /MiracleMax
14 posted on 08/15/2008 5:51:23 AM PDT by NonValueAdded (College kid: "Do you have a minute for Obama?" NVA: "Not now or ever.")
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To: fireforeffect; wagglebee
Larry Niven wrote an entire series of SF novels about this.

The Gil the A.R.M. story cycle to be specific, although there are echos of it in most of Niven's other universes. Well worth a read (as are all the Known Space stories), if you can find any of it. I think it has been out of print for a while.

15 posted on 08/15/2008 5:53:39 AM PDT by jboot (Let Christ be true and every man a liar.)
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To: wagglebee

(The msm will bury this news)

The msm is brain dead.


16 posted on 08/15/2008 5:55:47 AM PDT by jincarolina
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To: jincarolina

Good point.


17 posted on 08/15/2008 5:56:18 AM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: Bobalu
I think it would be an extremely small number of cases where brain death occurs and yet somehow the patient would later regain consciousness.

ONE is too many.

Where this info is important is in cases where they want to take people off life support citing statistics saying they will never recover...that is different than being an informed organ donor.

There are ways to be an organ donor WITHOUT putting it on your license.

18 posted on 08/15/2008 5:58:47 AM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: fetal heart beats by 21st day; floriduh voter

I don’t have any objection to somebody having my organs as long as I’m REALLY DEAD. But I WILL NOT be killed off just to get to them.


19 posted on 08/15/2008 6:00:15 AM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: wagglebee

Thanks for posting.


20 posted on 08/15/2008 6:00:55 AM PDT by PGalt
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