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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!seismo!ut-sally!riddle
From: riddle@ut-sally.UUCP (Prentiss Riddle)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.med
Subject: Re: Regulation of organ donations ("individual control")
Message-ID: <1343@ut-sally.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 15-Mar-84 00:46:25 EST
Article-I.D.: ut-sally.1343
Posted: Thu Mar 15 00:46:25 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 10-Mar-84 09:53:44 EST
References: <1014@inmet.UUCP>
Organization: U. of Tx. at Houston-in-the-Hills
Lines: 24

>> >> There is a move afoot in the congress to regulate organ donations
>> >> at the federal level.  One of the proposed provisions would
>> >> prohibit the sale of any body parts.  The supposed rationale for
>> >> this is to prevent the poor from becoming "spare parts heaps" for
>> >> the rich.
>>
>> I thought the rationale for this was to prevent rich people from
>> "outbidding" poor people in their efforts to get an organ.
>>
>> Beth Mazur   {ima,harpo,esquire}!inmet!mazur

I heard some discussion of this issue not long ago on NPR.  I don't
think the issue is "outbidding", especially since organ transplants are
already quite costly operations even aside from the cost of the organs
themselves.  It has more to do with the source of the organs.  At the
moment, a growing number of organs are bought from donors in the third
world, people who may be in desperate need of cash but who are without
the resources to, say, go on dialysis if their remaining kidney fails.
Prohibiting the sale of organs within this country was seen as the most
effective means of cutting down on unscrupulous purchases of organs
abroad.

--- Prentiss Riddle ("Aprendiz de todo, maestro de nada.")
--- {ihnp4,seismo,ctvax}!ut-sally!riddle