Why Not Legalize Organ Selling?

[JimBowie1958]

Cash for Kidneys: The Case for a Market for Organs - WSJ.com

In 2012, 95,000 American men, women and children were on the waiting list for new kidneys, the most commonly transplanted organ. Yet only about 16,500 kidney transplant operations were performed that year. Taking into account the number of people who die while waiting for a transplant, this implies an average wait of 4.5 years for a kidney transplant in the U.S.

The situation is far worse than it was just a decade ago, when nearly 54,000 people were on the waiting list, with an average wait of 2.9 years. For all the recent attention devoted to the health-care overhaul, the long and growing waiting times for tens of thousands of individuals who badly need organ transplants hasn't been addressed.

Finding a way to increase the supply of organs would reduce wait times and deaths, and it would greatly ease the suffering that many sick individuals now endure while they hope for a transplant. The most effective change, we believe, would be to provide compensation to people who give their organs—that is, we recommend establishing a market for organs....

The toll on those waiting for kidneys and on their families is enormous, from both greatly reduced life expectancy and the many hardships of being on dialysis. Most of those on dialysis cannot work, and the annual cost of dialysis averages about $80,000. The total cost over the average 4.5-year waiting period before receiving a kidney transplant is $350,000, which is much larger than the $150,000 cost of the transplant itself.

Individuals can live a normal life with only one kidney, so about 34% of all kidneys used in transplants come from live donors. The majority of transplant kidneys come from parents, children, siblings and other relatives of those who need transplants. The rest come from individuals who want to help those in need of transplants...

Paying donors for their organs would finally eliminate the supply-demand gap. In particular, sufficient payment to kidney donors would increase the supply of kidneys by a large percentage, without greatly increasing the total cost of a kidney transplant.

We have estimated how much individuals would need to be paid for kidneys to be willing to sell them for transplants. These estimates take account of the slight risk to donors from transplant surgery, the number of weeks of work lost during the surgery and recovery periods, and the small risk of reduction in the quality of life.

Our conclusion is that a very large number of both live and cadaveric kidney donations would be available by paying about $15,000 for each kidney. That estimate isn't exact, and the true cost could be as high as $25,000 or as low as $5,000—but even the high estimate wouldn't increase the total cost of kidney transplants by a large percentage.

Few countries have ever allowed the open purchase and sale of organs, but Iran permits the sale of kidneys by living donors. Scattered and incomplete evidence from Iran indicates that the price of kidneys there is about $4,000 and that waiting times to get kidneys have been largely eliminated.

Nearly 5,000 people die each year waiting for a kidney for transplant, and all because the laws forbid selling one's organs.

This is just stupidity to the nth degree unless someone can make a case that nearly 5,000 lives are spared each year by keeping the sale of one's organs illegal.

Meanwhile you can give your organs away with voluntary organ donation and thus give hospitals an incentive to not do all it can to save your life or pull the plug just a little quicker than legally required.

Legalizing the sale of kidneys would save lives, period (and not an Obama period either).

 

[JoeB131]

Yup, that's what we need, let rich people buy organs from poor people.

 

[AquaAthena]

I'm in favor of selling organs, not taking into account riches, rather freedom of choice.

 

[Big Black Dog]

I see no problem with selling organs. They've been selling pianos for years.

 

[JakeStarkey]

I agree with JimB and AquaA on this: this is a freedom of personal choice.

The individual should get the $$$ not the companies that harvest them.

 

[AquaAthena]

I see no problem with selling organs. They've been selling pianos for years.

What a great guy!

 

[aaronleland]

I see no problem with selling organs. They've been selling pianos for years.

Bad dog! BAD... DOG!!!!

 

[aaronleland]

A downside I can see is a black market for organs springing up. Criminals could illegally harvest organs, and sell them to rich people. Therefore, only criminals and rich people would benefit from it's legalization.

 

[ShootSpeeders]

As it is, the people who man the panels that decide who gets the organs, collect huge under-the-table bribes for giving the organs to the rich. Far better to let the donor get that money.

 

[Connery]

Create a situation where upon death organs are harvested by private concerns for which they pay in advance while the donor is still alive.

 

[Pop23]

Yup, that's what we need, let rich people buy organs from poor people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XhSfv3Kc7Q

What do you have against poor people?

 

[whitehall]

It's not a bad idea. Using the same reasoning as libs when they defend abortion as a "woman's right to do what she wants with her own body" why not give a person the chance to make half a million or a million dollars by selling a kidney? It's funny that it's legal to give an organ away but not to sell it.

 

[JimBowie1958]

A downside I can see is a black market for organs springing up. Criminals could illegally harvest organs, and sell them to rich people. Therefore, only criminals and rich people would benefit from it's legalization.

That already exists.

THE ORGAN TRADE: A Global Black Market; Tracking the Sale of a Kidney On a Path of Poverty and Hope - New York Times

 

[JimBowie1958]

Yup, that's what we need, let rich people buy organs from poor people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XhSfv3Kc7Q

What do you have against poor people?

Democrats have no use for them if they aren't poor any more.

Then they become the enemy, lol.

 

[Noomi]

No way should you be able to sell your organs - rich people who needed one would pay for one from a poor person. The poor would lose, as usual.

 

[JimBowie1958]

No way should you be able to sell your organs - rich people who needed one would pay for one from a poor person. The poor would lose, as usual.

Leave it to a libtard to say that a freely agreed transaction between two people that benefits both is bad because.....? of no reason at all they just think that it would be.

roflmao

 

[HenryBHough]

You really believe that organs are not already routinely bought?

No, realllllly????

 

[JimBowie1958]

You really believe that organs are not already routinely bought?

No, realllllly????

Sure they are, but this would be legal and above the table.

We have blood banks, why not a kidney bank?

 

[HenryBHough]

Imagine a future where stem cell research has allowed routine regrowing of organs. Then a new employment opportunity would arise. A person not interested in actual work could just lie around and grow organs for sale.

 

[ShootSpeeders]

It's funny that it's legal to give an organ away but not to sell it.

The AMA doesn't want to share the profit.