Compensation for Organ Donation
Many people’s lives come to an end earlier than expected. When this happens, families mourn the loss of the loved one. However, do people mourn the loss of another life if the individual is not an organ donor? The National Kidney Foundation believes that “legalizing payments of human organs” should continue to be opposed, as codified in the third title of the National Organ Transplant Act. (National Kidney Foundation 220). If this title is changed, then there will be multiple unexpected side effects that could corrupt the system of organ donation to people who need the organs. What exactly would define the price of saving a life? Who is paying the cost of the organ? Many things could backlash from the
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Organ receivers around the country would have to have the money to pay for the organ before having the procedure done. These issues could ultimately affect all economically disadvantaged people in need of organs.
The cost of a kidney is easily in the range of thousands to hundred-thousands of dollars. Being paid to donate an organ would include monetary rewards, free or cheaper insurance, or a lower cost of taxes. This may highly appeal to people with lower incomes, or the economically disadvantaged. These statements were released by the National Kidney Foundation:
Offering money for organs can be viewed as an attempt to coerce economically disadvantaged Americans to participate in organ donation. Furthermore, since the economically disadvantaged have been shown to be less likely to be organ transplant candidates, financial incentives for organ donation could be characterized as exploitation (National Kidney Foundation 221).
This contingency comes to state that the financially disadvantaged are proven to be less likely to donate. Therefore, financial compensation may pressure some people into donating organs despite the health risks. Financial compensation may argue against itself. A key example is that some people may not be able to afford medical bills, so they decide to donate a kidney to pay other bills. However, if the donation of a kidney worsens the
Joy Victory 's "Need an Organ? It Helps to Be Rich" provides great factual evidence to support her main claim that the rich have more advantages for acquiring an organ than do the poor and uninsured. The extensive factual evidence includes a personal account of an uninsured organ candidate, statistics and multiple expert testimonies to indicate that many variables hinder the poor and uninsured from receiving an organ. One of the most important variables is the socio-economic status of the potential organ recipient because statistics and evidence indicate receiving organs is determined primarily on a financial basis. Also, the article suggests the uninsured and poor not only suffer from physical ailments but also from a lack of hope for obtaining an organ. One of the ways Victory uses factual evidence is by narrating a personal account of an uninsured 34- year-old who is not only suffering physically but also suffering from a lack of hope for obtaining an organ. Brian Regions, the uninsured 34- year-old, is physically in agony every day with congestive heart failure and is consistently facing insufficient health care (Victory 736). As Victory accurately points out, Regions is not the only uninsured individual who is at risk for his expensive physical problems. It is also reported that there are thousands of others who are in physical agony with incurable heart damage (Victory 736). Without future heart support and financial intervention, Regions and many others may
'Proponents of financial incentives for organ donation assert that a demonstration project is necessary to confirm or refute the types of concerns mentioned above. The American Medical Association, the United Network for Organ Sharing and the Ethics Committee of the American Society of Transplant Surgeons have called for pilot studies of financial incentives. Conversely, the National Kidney Foundation maintains that it would not be feasible to design a pilot project that would definitively demonstrate the efficacy of financial incentives for organ donation. Moreover, the implementation of a pilot project would have the same corrosive effect on the ethical, moral and social fabric of this country that a formal change in policy would have. Finally, a demonstration project is objectionable because it will be difficult to revert to an altruistic system once payment is initiated, even if it becomes evident that financial incentives don 't have a positive impact on organ donation. '(http://www.kidney.org/news/newsroom/positionpaper03)
Courage is the ability to act despite fear. This can be said in many ways, but the best example of this word is the war hero Desmond Doss. Out of all the charter traits that he fulfills, the most prevalent is courage. In the Battle of Hacksaw Ridge, Desmond Doss exemplified a selfless sense of courage, not just on the ridge, but throughout his time throughout the war. At the beginning of the war many men were being drafted due to their jobs, but Desmond Doss was not one of these people.
The article “Need an Organ? It Helps to be Rich,” by Joy Victory informs readers of how medical systems work for those who are in need of an organ transplant. In the article, Victory talks about a 34-year-old man named Brian Shane Regions - who is in need of a heart transplant, but is not able to secure one because he is not insured. Therefore, not having insurance, Brian is put into an unfortunate situation because he is simply not getting any treatment for his heart failure. This is a great example of how patients without insurance could not be provided with an organ donor. Victory argues a variety of issues concerning how the organ donation system is unfair to certain people. A transplant cost a bundle amount of money, which leads to the rich only able to have the procedure done. While the poor cannot afford the cost of the transplant, creating an unfair situation for the less fortunate. The transplant centers can do anything as they please because they simply care more about the money. However, not all transplant centers treat their patients unfairly, several centers are truly able to support the uninsured patients in need of a transplant. It is simply unfair for the patients, who do not have enough money to pay for transplant and the medical systems are unethical.
Participants would be provided with a consent for them to participate, and this form would indicate a description of the research. After obtaining the consent form, both caregiver and participants would be informed that the surveys are anonymous. During the completion of the surveys, the participants will be instructed to complete the entire survey with accurate information. In addition, I would inform the participants that they will not be time, and the surveys can be discontinued at any time.
The demand for organ donors far exceeds the supply of available organs. According to the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) … there are more than 77,000 people in the U.S. who are waiting to receive an organ (Organ Selling 1). The article goes on to say that the majority of those on the national organ transplant waiting list are in need of kidneys, an overwhelming 50,000 people. Although financial gain in the U.S and in most countries is illegal, by legalizing and structuring a scale for organ donor monetary payment, the shortage of available donors could be reduced. Legalizing this controversial issue will help with the projected forecast for a decrease in the number of people on the waiting list, the ethical concerns around benefitting from organ donation, and to include compensation for the organ donor.
The Topic I decided to debate was should college athletes be paid a salary? The side that I decided to pick was the pro side. To begin every year many new college athletes get drafted, they are excited to play a college sport and represent their school. But, these students may face a different challenge outside of school. These challenges may include not having enough money to pay for tuition, not enough money for new clothes, they may still live with their parents in a spare bedroom, and they may not have enough money for food.
Every day, 20 people die because they are unable to receive a vital organ transplant that they need to survive. Some of these people are on organ donation lists and some of them are not. The poor and minorities are disproportionately represented among those who do not receive the organs they need. In the United States alone, nearly 116,000 people are on waiting lists for vital organ transplants. Another name is added to this list every 10 minutes. This paper will argue that organ donation should not be optional. Every person who dies, or enters an irreversible vegetative state with little or no brain function, should have his or her organs-more specifically, those among the organs that are suitable for donation-harvested. A single healthy donor who has died can save up to eight lives (American Transplant Foundation).
In the United States, there are currently 116,608 people in need of a lifesaving organ transplant, and 75,684 people that are currently active waiting list candidates (HRSA, 2017). Between January and September 2017, there have only been 12,211 organ donors (HRSA, 2017) which is far less that the current demand for lifesaving organs. The shortage of donors could lead to an individual looking for outside sources such as the black market to find their lifesaving organ. Offering incentives to persons who chose to donate their organs or those of a deceased loved one is important because it could stop the illegal selling of organs, save the life of someone in need of an organ transplant and benefit both the donor and recipient.
Today, medical operations save lives around the world, a feat that surely would surprise our ancestors. Many operations replace defective organs with new ones; for new organs to be ready to be implanted there need to be organ donors. We are not so advanced a society that we can grow replacement organs. Thousands of organ donors in the United States every year are seen as doing the most noble of deeds in modern civilization, and most of the time death has to occur before the organ can be used. Now, though, some are suggesting that organ donors—or their beneficiaries—should be paid for their donations. This should not happen, as it creates a strain on the already tight national budget, forces
In addition, surgeons have learned how to keep increasingly patients alive longer and how to make more people eligible for transplants. Still, there are shortage of organs donation. According to the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS), a non-profit, scientific and educational organization, organizes transplant registration. 3448 people died in 1995 because organs were not available for them in time. A third to a half of all people on waiting lists die before an organ can be found for them. This shortage raises several difficult ethical problems. How should the limited supply of organs be distributed? Should donors be encouraged to donate by the use of financial incentives? Opponents of the sale of organs point out that the inevitable result will be further exploitation of poor people by the
In the United States, there are over one hundred thousand people on the waiting list to receive a life-saving organ donation, yet only one out of four will ever receive that precious gift (Statistics & Facts, n.d.). The demand for organ donation has consistently exceeded supply, and the gap between the number of recipients on the waiting list and the number of donors has increased by 110% in the last ten years (O'Reilly, 2009). As a result, some propose radical new ideas to meet these demands, including the selling of human organs. Financial compensation for organs, which is illegal in the United States, is considered repugnant to many. The solution to this ethical dilemma isn’t found in a wallet; there are other alternatives available
The legalization of organ sales has been proposed as a solution to two distinct problems. The first is the problem of illegal organ trafficking and the second is the problem of inadequate supplies of organs available for transplants. Gregory (2011) outlined the case for legalizing organ sales by arguing that the current shortage of organs fuels a black market trade that benefits nobody except criminals. He further argues that such a move would add organs to the market, thereby saving the lives of those who would otherwise die without a transplant, while delivering fair value to the person donating the organ. There are a number of problems with the view that legalizing the organ trade is beneficial. Such a move would exacerbate negative health outcomes for the poor, strengthening inequality, but such a move would also violate any reasonable standard of ethics, by inherently placing a price on one's life and health. This paper will expand on these points and make the case that we should not allow people to pay for organs.
Organ donations not only save lives but also money and time. If organ donations became prevalent the organ recipient would no longer need dialysis. Since there is no need for dialysis the cost to use the machine would lessen; this means that the cost of equipment would decrease, saving the hospital and insurance company’s money. More lives would be saved as well as benefit from those that no longer need an organ. In the book titled “Elements of Bioethics” adult organ transplants are only that have medical insurance. If organs are taken from recently deceased the cost for those that has no medical coverage was lessen. The process of organ transplantation is life changing and time is crucial. With shorter waiting time it would put ease on the person’s heart to know that this lifesaving event would happen sooner rather than later. In addition, when the organ is taken from the recently deceased the risk would be eliminated from
Despite the fact it is illegal to sell organs, to help increase the numbers of donors, some states are offering to pay the family indirectly. “If a family agrees to organ donation, Pennsylvania pays $300 directly to the family’s funeral home to help defray the cost of the funeral” (Organ Donation). With some states paying the family indirectly, there has been an increase in the number of donors. Being paid indirectly helps the families immensely. Not only does this help with the costs, but it takes away any stress they may have had about being able to afford the funeral. There’s no question that a change needs to be made to help improve the number of available organs.