[ql06] CRIMINAL: Human organs trade
- From: "Ken Campbell -- LAW'06" <2kc16@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <ql06@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 30 Sep 2003 16:37:18 -0400
Relates directly to Moore v. UCLA Regents.
Geez, I didn't realize Moldova was hurting so bad. $50 per capita GDP??
Betcha they really love their independence from Russia (or Romania).
Ken.
--
But, my dear man, reality is only a
Rorschach ink-blot, you know.
-- Alan Watts
--- cut here ---
EU demands action as crime gangs milk trade in kidneys for transplant
By Jeremy Laurance
Health Editor
The Independent (U.K.)
30 September 2003
The illegal trafficking of human organs is "an attack on human dignity"
which must be stopped, the Council of Europe has said.
A parliamentary assembly of the council called for a common European
strategy to fight international crime syndicates cashing in on the
shortage of kidneys available for transplant in Europe. The groups often
target impoverished eastern European countries such as Ukraine and
Moldova, according to a report by the council.
Demand for kidneys is soaring in all Western countries as more patients
are suffering kidney failure and the supply of organs is falling. The
report says that 40,000 patients are waiting for a transplant in western
Europe, and 15 to 30 per cent will die on the waiting list.
The average wait for a transplant is three years, and by 2010 it is
expected to have increased to 10 years. Desperate patients are prepared
to spend tens of thousands of pounds and take whatever risks are
necessary to save their lives.
The going price paid to young people in eastern Europe for one of their
kidneys is $2,500 to $3,000 (£1,500 to £1,800), the report says.
Patients receiving the kidneys are reported to have paid between
$100,000 and $200,000 for a transplant.
In Britain, kidney patients are known to have travelled abroad, mainly
to India, to buy organs. A survey conducted at Queen Elizabeth Hospital,
Birmingham, published last year, revealed that 29 NHS patients had
bought kidneys which were transplanted abroad. In more than half the
cases the kidney failed, and a third of the patients died.
Trafficking networks are targeting poor European countries. Moldova,
Europe's poorest country, with an average monthly salary under $50, is a
prime target.
The report describes the case of Lurie Sobetchi, aged 21, from Moldova,
who was persuaded to sell one of his kidneys for $7,000. He was taken to
a hospital in Turkey, where the transplant was carried out in February
2002. His kidney was sold to a Russian living in Israel.
After the operation Mr Sobetchi reported the men who he said organised
the transplant, a doctor at a hospital in Moldova and an alleged
accomplice. Both were arrested.
Living donors are being increasingly used for kidney transplants
worldwide as the results are better for the recipients and donors can
lead normal lives with one kidney, if they have good medical care.
But the report says: "It is a matter of grave concern that following the
illegal transplant, the donor's state of health generally worsens in the
medium term, due to the absence of any medical follow-up, hard physical
work and an unhealthy lifestyle connected to inadequate nutrition and
high consumption of alcohol."
In the UK, transplant surgeons have called for a debate on paid donation
as a way of increasing the supply of organs. Although paid donation is
widely regarded as unethical, a small but growing number of surgeons say
the sale of organs should be made legal to improve the supply and to
safeguard those involved, given the desperation of patients and the
readiness of donors to sell their organs on the black market.
John Dark, a transplant surgeon at the Freeman Hospital, Newcastle, said
it was difficult to draw a moral difference between the physical harm
inflicted on someone paid for a kidney or paid to work in a Third World
sweat shop.
"The real problem is that [paying for a kidney] involves inflicting harm
on someone for financial gain. We have no problem with inflicting harm
on people for altruistic reasons for example by taking their blood.
But there are also lots of examples of inflicting harm on people for
payment like requiring them to work down coal mines. A man trying to
support his family by selling a kidney is no different to putting in
shifts down a diamond mine. Society has moved on from where paying for
harm was unthinkable. We do it every day when we buy a pair of
trainers."
But Mr Dark said allowing the trade would "open up a can of worms" that
could be avoided by boosting the supply of organs in other ways.
HOW ONE 'BLOOD DONOR' WAS TARGETED
Four years ago, Sergei was lured from his home in Moldova to Turkey with
the promise of a job.
When it failed to materialise the woman who had made the promise told
him he would have to sell his blood to raise the bus fare home.
Having no other option, Sergei made his way to a private hospital she
directed him to, on the outskirts of Istanbul. There, he said, he had a
jab in the arm which put him to sleep.
Hours later he woke. "My whole body was aching," he said. "I couldn't
get up. I had a feeling that something was missing inside me." As the
anaesthetic wore off, he was visited by the woman.
She told him bluntly: "We have taken a kidney. There is nothing you can
do. I will give you £1,800 for it. Otherwise, you can get yourself out
of your predicament on your own."
Sergei took the money and returned to Moldova. "Six months later, all I
had left to remind me was a stamp in my passport and a pain in my left
side," he told a reporting team from the BBC's Newsnight programme.
Moldova has become a prime target for human organ traffickers because of
the widespread poverty and lack of prospects in the country. Most sell
their organs willingly but there is no lack of volunteers. A person's
body parts may be the only items of value that they possess.
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