During the earlier eras milk was considered a delicacy in many cultures. The rich enjoyed the milks creamy taste while the poor milked sheep’s, cows, and goats to sell the milk and make money to support their families and pay bills. In this era many people can get milk easily but what about a kidney transplant? Kidneys have become a luxury only the rich can afford, unless you can wait months or years to receive one from a donor at no cost. Because of the current system of accepting kidneys only from dead patients and Good Samaritan donors provide too few kidneys we need to legalize the selling and buying of kidneys from independent sources.
People are being kidnapped and killed for their organs and people themselves are selling their organs to the wealthier, putting their lives in danger to support their families with the money they receive. In the mid-1980s, rumors that Americans were kidnapping children throughout Central America only to harvest their organs led to brutal attacks on American tourists in the region. When those stories proved false, the State Department classified organ-trafficking reports under "urban legend" (Interlandi). The exchange of human organs for cash or any other "valuable consideration" (such as a car or a vacation) is illegal in every country except Iran. Nonetheless, international organ trafficking--mostly of kidneys, but also of half-livers, eyes, skin and blood--is flourishing; the World Health Organization estimates that one fifth of the 70,000 kidneys transplanted worldwide every year come from the black market (Interlandi). Frank Delmonico, a surgery professor at Harvard Medical School and adviser to the WHO said, "Organ selling has become a global problem.” "It's likely to get much worse unless we confront the challenges of policing it" (Interlandi).
This problem is affecting many people all around the world. Families suffer the loss of their children who have been killed or stolen to practice this illegal surgery and later thrown into the streets. Many people are afraid to travel because since they are tourist it is easier for them to get kidnapped, especially their children. "In books and movies, you find these stories of people waking up in bathtubs full of ice with a scar where one of their kidneys used to be. People assumed it was just science fiction" (Interlandi). Tourist can be given drugs to without notice and perhaps when they do wake up their missing an organ. Although people are afraid to travel patients in need of organs will go to a different country where they can afford to buy a kidney instead of waiting for a donation. These patients will travel to developing countries where family members or spouses are selling one another to contribute to the family’s income. They need the money to support their families and may believe that living with half an organ is okay.
If the sale of kidneys were to be legalized it would save countless lives and put an end to the international trafficking of live human organs. Infections from transplants would be reduced and both the vendor and recipient will be safe. Infections remain an important cause of morbidity and mortality in patients with chronic kidney disease (Sueli). This would cause a problem for those who believe that there is too much at risk involved for the vendors and for their own good it should be prohibited. Another argument is that only Altruism can justify this type of sacrifice and that only donations are accepted because sales are motivated through greed (J. Radcliffe). The final and most notorious argument is that if the sale of kidneys were to be legalized, it would result in the economically disadvantage selling parts of their bodies to the wealthy.
Saying that vendors are too much at risk for selling their organs is very hypocritical. That is because as a society we allow and pass laws to sell drugs for “medication” purposes and sell alcohol to mostly anybody when it is unhealthy and even fatal. No one can object to the fact that having a kidney removed is dangerous but the risks are similar to those of any major surgery. But according to the University of Maryland Medical center after recovering from surgery, a donor can work, drive, exercise and participate in sports, though contact sports are not recommended (UMM). Knowing that this is safe will encourage more people to donate or sell their organs at hospitals. Many vendors are at risk for selling their organs now but if we could legalize this problem then vendors would be at a smaller risk because they will be receiving medical attention at hospitals.
For the second argument it is wrong of us to assume that that money will not be used to improve the lives of others, for many vendors the money will be used to make life better for their families or even provide health care to a sick family member. The reason why most people in Brazil sell their kidneys is to make ends meet or to pay for a family members medical bill (Rother). It does not matter if the recipient gets the kidney from a donor or a vendor as long as the kidney works. Sure many might want to just sell their organs as a chance for extra money. They might use it to go on vacation or to buy cars and luxuries but many of the vendors are from developing countries and to them it is just the income they need to survive by exchanging it with an organ and saving someone else’s life.
For the final argument many people may say kidney sales can be the beginning to a slippery slope towards selling other more essential organs. According to Bio-Medicine.org, if legislators and congressmen can spend so much time on creating a law that prohibits smoking inside a public area why can they not take some time to draft a law that clearly allows kidney selling but forbids other forms of organ selling.
The solution is to legalize the selling of kidneys and other illegal organs that are being sold in the black market. Of course we do not want people going under the knife without professional medical assistance. Hospitals can be set up to accept people who want to give their kidneys for a good price; everyone’s organs will be equally priced even from different counties. That way there is no status discrimination since the majority of people have the same internal human body organs. People will be happy selling there kidneys, as somebody with one can lead an almost entirely normal life and pay for bills. Patients can than choose if they want to be on the waitlist or buy organs from the hospital. The price of organs will be higher than that which the vendors sold it to the hospital that way the extra money can be used to cover the expense of extra doctors, nurses, researchers, hospitals, and facilities such as recovery centers for both the vendors and patients to recover and become stronger.
People who disagree with my solution might think this is crazy and legalizing would only increase the amount of people putting their life in danger to sell organs. But in fact this will actually be an easier and healthier process for donors and recipients, both gaining a profit. Nobody will be forced to donate or sell their organs; it will be their decision on whether they sell their organs or donate them without a profit just to help. Others might say that children may be taken advantage of by their own parents and have no choice on whether they should keep or give their kidneys because of greedy or desperate parents who need the money. If organ selling is legalized there would also be a law with it that children cannot sell their organs until the age of 10 or 12, depending on when they can decide for themselves and not influenced by their elders.
We can implement a law by starting off with a bill that states all the pros and cons to legalizing the selling of organs. Starting with hospitals that practice this illegally, we can convince them to write procedures and how it is un-ethical to receive a ridiculous amount of money by illegally transplanting organs. If it were to be legalized then every doctor can have the opportunity to equally win money and feel good about helping both the vendors and patients receiving the transplant. Doctors will not have the need to hide and pretend nothing is going on. After that we can make a law that everyone in the world can vote on. Both developed and developing countries can be heard and decide on whether we should legalize this issue or just let it be an under the table process.
Having campaigns that promote the wellbeing of selling kidneys legally and how the money can help families. These campaigns will cost a lot of money that we can ask the government for. We will provide them with reasons to support our cause and how they will be helping many people and not just for the United States. After that we can contact many charities that collect money for children and ask them to help us too, with a lot of funding we can then travel around the world to properly teach and let people know about the dangers and the good things that will come if we legalize this. After we have placed hospitals to do these procedures we can also place health care centers in which people have free access to and regain their strength after giving an organ. Implementing this solution might take up to five years or less if we can really show how dangerous this problem has become and how it is affecting everyone. Millions of people need organ transplants a year and they would really want to make this process easier since they are racing time. Our campaign’s will mainly be targeting organ transplant patients, vendors, and families who want to protect their children. With these benefits many people can agree that legalizing the selling of organs is better than selling on the black market and gaining themselves any profit.
Solving this problem will help many people and make the world a safer place to travel. There will be no more killing for organs, and people will live a longer, safer, and economically better life. If we fix this problem will be solving many problems such as children or adults missing and finding another solution to a healthier life for those in need of a kidney or other organs. They would have the decision to either wait or buy an organ for a transplant instead of waiting five to ten years. Economically many families will live better and not have to worry about paying bills or owing money to others because they will have this money as an extra income and have better lives. There might be other solutions to my problem such as doctors removing a portion of an organ at birth and having farms will they will grow and nurture organs with steroids and other substances that will make organs function normally. This way everyone in the world will be donating an organ at birth and we would have sufficient organs to donate for free and people would not have the interest to kidnap one another for their organs or sell on the black market for a ridiculous amount of money. Although that may be another solution there is a problem to it, parents will not be able to decide whether they want their babies to go under this procedure. My solution is a better system that will work and give people options.
Even if the solution fixes the problem we still might have people trafficking organs for more money and greed. Although selling organs will be legal it would and should only be sold to and bought by hospitals. This way every procedure will be safe and more lives will be kept instead of having unprofessional people cutting into your skin for an organ and putting your life at risk. This matters because if we do not propose a solution to this arising problem then it will only get larger and more tourist, vulnerable children, and adults will start to disappear because people will take their organs away and hopefully not killed. Many people will still be affected by this problem and lose family members. This issue should be looked into because it will save countless lives and the government will gain control to this controversy.
The point is to save lives, have options, individuals have the right to decide whether they want to donate or sell their organs and receive a profit and health benefits for free instead of being kidnapped and have their organs removed without a profit and high risk of becoming sick or having an infection that might defeat their immune system. Legalizing the selling of organs with my implementation and solution will make the world safer to live in and having safe procedures will help us have a healthier more profitable life.
Work cited
· Beecham, Linda. "Expert Group Will Look At Transplanting Animal Organs To Humans." BMJ: British Medical Journal (International Edition) 312.7023 (1996): 126. Academic Search Premier. Web. 13 Nov. 2011.
· DA Mandelbrot, et al. "Spouse Caregivers Of Kidney Transplant Patients: Quality Of Life And Psychosocial Outcomes." Progress In Transplantation 20.4 (2010): 335-343. CINAHL Plus with Full Text. Web. 13 Nov. 2011.
· Interlandi, Jeneen. "Not Just Urban Legend." Newsweek 153.3 (2009): 41-45. Academic Search Premier. Web. 13 Nov. 2011.
· J. Radcliffe, Richards. “The Case for Allowing Kidney Sales.”
· “Should the sale of organs be legalized?” Bio-Medicine. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Nov.
· Singer, Peter. "Kidneys For Sale?." Free Inquiry 30.1 (2009): 14. Academic Search Premier. Web. 13 Nov. 2011.
· Sueli, Donizete Borelli, et al. "Infections In Patients With Chronic Renal Failure And Kidney Transplant Recipients In Brazil." Progress In Transplantation 21.3 (2011): 249-253. CINAHL Plus with Full Text. Web. 13 Nov. 2011.
· UMM. “Living Kidney Donor Frequently Asked Questions.” N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2011
· Rother, Larry. “The Organ Trade.” New York Times 23 May. 2004
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