LOS MARGINADOS: BioEdge: Iran’s legal market in kidneys creates a black market, too

sábado, 21 de octubre de 2017

BioEdge: Iran’s legal market in kidneys creates a black market, too

BioEdge: Iran’s legal market in kidneys creates a black market, too

Bioedge

Iran’s legal market in kidneys creates a black market, too

by Michael Cook | 21 Oct 2017 |

ads posted in Teheran offering to sell kidneys

Iran is the only country in the world where people can sell their kidneys legally. According to a report in the Los Angeles Times, recipients pay US$4,600 to the government transplant, and the donor (or seller) receives this when the operation is over.

“Yes, people donate because they need money, but this is a reality all over the world,” said Nasser Simforoosh, a Tehran transplant surgeon. “Instead of doing something illegal to cover their debts, like stealing or smuggling, they are saving a life first. This is not exploitation. The end result is good for the recipient and the donor.”

Unfortunately, in the shadow of the legal system a booming black market in organs has sprung up in which donors can sell their kidneys at a premium. Despite government crackdowns on illegal transplant operations, foreigners, ex-pats, or patients who do not want to wait in a queue are willing to pay higher rates. Near hospitals in Teheran are posters advertising the kidneys of the desperate and indebted. “If I could sell my kidney, I could get out of debt,” Ali Rezaei, a bankrupt 42-year-old told the LA Times. “I would sell my liver too.”

“The price is going to go higher and higher,” said Behrooz Broumand, of the Iranian Society of Organ Transplantation. “Transplant commercialism is a race. As long as there is poverty, they cannot stop it.”

Saturday, October 21, 2017

If you are not inclined to be disputatious, don’t visit Australia at the moment. Across the country is a heated debate about same-sex marriage. According to the bookies, the Yes vote is set to win, although the No vote is giving its opponents a good run for the money. Newspapers are full of op-eds for and against; the broadcast media seems to be only “for”; and Twitter is going wild.

But something equally important is being debated: assisted suicide. The lower house of the state of Victoria yesterday voted for a bill which will legalise it. If it passes, other states will almost certainly follow. It will mark a dramatic turn in Australia’s law and medicine. But – compared to same-sex marriage – almost no one is talking about it.

What accounts for the difference? Oxford bioethicist Professor Julian Savulescu, writing in The Conversation, says that people fear death and like talking about sex and that in evolutionary terms, death is less important than reproduction.

It’s an interesting question. I don’t believe that I agree with his answer. I think that people intuitively understand that control of marriage is the hinge of social life and are reluctant to redefine it.

But what do you think? Why is the debate over same-sex marriage so much more engaging than the equally important debate over euthanasia?