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Posted on 02/19/2012 12:27:32 PM PST by wagglebee
Some of the most controversial methods of obtaining organs have been endorsed by the British Medical Association in a report released this week. “Building on Progress: what next for organ donation policy in the UK?” laments “the fact that… people are still dying unnecessarily because of a lack of organs”.
Among the measures it proposes are:
All of these measures have been debated extensively over the past few years.
The procedure which the media focused on in its coverage was “elective ventilation”. “Brain dead” patients who have suffered a massive stroke would be kept alive purely to enable organ retrieval. This led to a 50% increase in organ retrieval in 1988 at a British hospital, but it was declared unlawful in 1994.
Transplant units in Spain and the US already use the technique, said Nigel Heaton, professor of transplant surgery at King's College hospital, London. "People have qualms about it. The concern is that you are prolonging or introducing futile treatment that has no benefit for the patient. But I expect that views will gradually change.”
Elective ventilation was criticised by Professor Nadey Hakim, of Hammersmith Hospital, as "bizarre and unethical". "It's not ethical keeping someone alive," he said. "They're brain dead and you have to remember there's a family next door in tears. I find it bizarre that the BMA wants to push for something so unpopular. This is how we kill any desire for people to become donors."
Retrieving hearts from newborn babies is still an experimental procedure. Life support would be withdrawn from disabled children and their heart would be removed about 75 seconds after it stopped beating. Although the BMA report does not mention it, this clearly violates the "dead donor" rule – that donors have to be dead before vital organs can be removed.
The report acknowledges that donation after cardiac death is a hard sell to the public, especially if a heart which stops beating in one body begins to beat again in another. However, the BMA believes that it is ethically acceptable, even though:
“A careful explanation of the way in which death is diagnosed will be needed and an explanation that a heart that has stopped beating can be restarted after the person has died and used for transplantation. It might also be helpful to refer to fact that the first heart transplant, under Christian Barnard, was from a DCD donor.”
And the solution will be to make donation mandatory.
The "Brave New World" is here and it's horrifying.
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•Elective ventilation: keeping patients alive solely so they can become organ donors,
•Retrieving hearts from newborn disabled babies,
•Using body parts from high-risk donors including the elderly, people with cancer, drug users and people with high-risk sexual behaviour.”
If this were the plot outline for a horror movie, the critics would be laughing at the absurdity.
A Modest Proposal.
OMG. How scary. And people snub their noses at me when I tell them NO WAY IN HELL would I sign my name on my driver’s license or put in my will that I want to be an organ donor.
Dear God, wagglebee, I was afraid to read he article and I was right.
The funds raised in these FReepathons go to pay our current quarter expenses. But we're also going to try to replace some of our older servers and failing equipment this year so we're going to add a little extra to our FReepathon goals. John is estimating ten to fifteen thousand to do this and I'd like to get it all in place and working before the election cycle is fully heated up, so we'll try to bring in a little extra now, if we can, and the rest next quarter.
Jim Robinson
A few years ago, there was an organ harvesting scandal in New York/New Jersey region.
Funeral homes were harvesting organs and body parts for transplants.
Probably the most famous person who had parts harvested was Alistar Cook,who died of cancer.
This is INFANTICIDE!
And just wait until someone decides to start removing organs from adults with disabilities.
The horrible evils are accelerating.
That begs the question of why the heart isn't restarted while it is in its owner's chest, instead of removing it to restart it in someone else's chest.
I still fail to see the rationale behind organ transplantation. When a person is so ill that their organs are failing, perhaps it's time for them to say goodbye, instead of hoping and praying for a healthy person to die so they can get the organs? As immoral as it is merely to hope for another person to die, isn't it far worse to hasten another person's death in order to harvest their organs?
Protesting the policy will move you to the top of the list
“Next thing they will be “suggesting” that organs be retrieved from living prisoners, starting with people on death row ... with the application of pressure and sufficient time, all convicted felons will be candidates for “ventilation!”
Wait until new organs can actually extend a person’s life beyond a normal lifespan. Larry Niven talked about this in some of his sci-fi, and not in a good way. From wiki:
“...the problem led to a repressive society almost unrecognizable by today’s standards. Since the average citizens wished to extend their lives, the world government sought to increase the supply by using condemned criminals to supply the organ banks. When this failed to meet the demand, citizens would vote for the death penalty for more and more trivial crimes. First violent crimes, then theft, tax evasion, false advertising, and even traffic violations became punishable by the organ banks.”
He was talking about “organ legging” back in the late 60’s.
Freegards
Paging Dr. Mengele.
These are the end times for Dewey Crowe.
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