Posted on 07/22/2025 6:22:36 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
The US Department of Health and Human Services said Monday that it’s undertaking an initiative to reform the country’s organ donation system, after a federal investigation found that one organization in the Kentucky region began the process to take organs from people who may not have been dead.
A House subcommittee is holding a hearing Tuesday on organ donation safety lapses and how procurement and transplant organizations intend to improve the system, to regain the trust of donors and their families. That trust is essential because the US organ donation system relies on people to volunteer to donate, often when they get a driver’s license.
As of 2022, about 170 million people in the US have signed up to donate their organs when they die, but there is always more demand for organs than what is available. Last year, there were more than 48,000 transplants in the US, but more than 103,000 people were on waiting lists. About 13 people in the United States die every day waiting for a transplant, according to the federal Health Resources and Services Administration.
HHS says the reform initiative was launched after an investigation by the Health Resources and Services Administration found problems with dozens of cases involving incomplete donations – when an organization started the process to take someone’s organs but, for some reason, the donation never happened.
According to a report on the federal investigation, as well as a memo prepared ahead of the House subcommittee hearing, the cases were managed by Kentucky Organ Donor Affiliates, a procurement organization that handles donations in Kentucky and parts of Ohio and West Virginia, which has merged with another group and is now called Network for Hope.
(Excerpt) Read more at channel3000.com ...
Reminiscent of the famous Monty Python line But I’m not yet dead.
Was David Crosby worthy of jumping to the head of the line for a new kidney?
Yet another reason why I am not an organ donor.
Oooh. A hearing. Reform? Yeah right. Maybe a sternly worded letter or two? If HHS gets real serious they might even use red or blue ink!
The primary reason I am not.
That thar patient looks to have a mighty purty liver.
Kentucky is now New China.
The great economist Walter Williams made a great case against donating organs. They are our property and we should be able to sell them upon death.
Bring out your dead!
CUSTOMER: Here’s one.
CART MASTER: Nine pence.
DEAD PERSON: I’m not dead!
CART MASTER: What?
CUSTOMER: Nothing. Here’s your nine pence.
DEAD PERSON: I’m not dead!
CART MASTER: ‘Ere. He says he’s not dead!
All transplanted organs are taken from people who are not dead, otherwise we could transplant organs from cadavers.
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