Organ Trafficking Research

Many of those who choose to sell their organ is either forced or manipulated by wealth. It is more likely for a poorer citizen from a developing country to be willing to supply n organ for a member of the upper class or for someone who can afford it, either through directly or through a broker. Brokers will do what every it takes to get what is being demanded. Some of the donors involved in organ trafficking are victims of body snatching or involuntary organ donations. Brokers will have the individual drugged and their organ removed without their consent to the procedure, they are also known for kidnaping poor and take whatever organ they desire and leave them there for dead. “Although estimates of trafficked persons are in their millions relatively few are identified” (Steinfall, T.M and Weitzer, R., 2011). Today brokers work with hospital staffs to locate poverty-stricken individuals to sell their organs for money. Some doctors often target children of poor countries in sell their organ in the black-market. In spite of its awareness, trafficking is still increasing. Trafficking a human organ is a growing profitable enterprise much like the unauthorized markets for weapons, humans, and drugs. Without the enforcement of laws against organ trafficking it is easier for an organ trafficker to buy and sell human organ increasing criminal

The buyer needs an organ. The seller needs cash. Two sides of the same coin, both parties are fueled by desperation to survive. With only one country in some way regulating its organ market economy (Iran), all other sales occur in the ever-expanding illegal trafficking network on a global scale. The World Health Organization defines organ trafficking as:

Dying painfully in a hospital bed is not the way anyone wants to go. Unfortunately for many people, it is a reality. Thousands of people a year end up dying while waiting for an organ that could save their lives. While on the other side of the world, thousands of people die a year, but from infection when an organ is forcefully taken from them to sell on the black market. There are two sides of the organ donation list, and both can end in death. This paper will discuss the shortage of donated organs and the issues with the current donation system. It will also discuss the black market for transplant organs and possible solutions to viable organ shortage. The focus of this paper will be on transplant kidneys as they are the most desirable organ for buyers and sellers.

So in the organ black market, a person exchanging his or her organs for money is called a “seller”. The average seller in transplant tourism is between the ages of 31-40 and are living in extreme poverty. In the perspective of the seller, there is another example of dire desperation. These people hardly make enough money to survive. In a research study conducted by Syed Naqvi, M.D., in 2006 219 sellers from Pakistan were surveyed. He asked them about their monthly incomes. These were the

“Organs” Satel insists, “are the rare trafficked good that saves lives.” ‘Yuan a Kidney?’ and ‘Financial Incentives for Organ Donation’ discuss opposing views of organ donation and trafficking. The National Kidney Foundation finds financial incentives for organ donation to be a form of exploitation, demeaning to society and all around unethical. Satel, however, holds a different perspective in the sense that if a citizen is informed and consenting to donating an organ to save another life for a monetary gain it could improve not only their welfare but the patient’s welfare as well. “Financial Incentives..” focuses strictly on a logical appeal; while “Yuan a Kidney?” is much more emotional while being logical. Satel provides the attention to donors as well as patients. NFK is speaking from a standpoint of legalities and ethics with no regards to donors as people willing to save a life, and little to patients in need of transplants.

“Ailing, rich patients are buying kidneys from the poor and desperate in burgeoning black markets. Clandestine kidney-sellers get little medical follow-up, buyers often catch hepatitis or HIV, and both endure the consequences of slap-dash surgery” (“Psst, Wanna . . . ” 15). This dangerous alternative provides one example of why the current organ donation system needs to be revised. Another example is that some patients pay to register with internet sites that try to help find organ donors. One site, Matchingdonors.com, charges a lifetime fee of $595 (Postrel 124). Not only do patients spend unnecessary amounts of money on these sites, many who find donors get rejected by hospitals. Hospitals fear that strangers designating a recipient may receive some sort of compensation for their donation (Postrel 124). The refusal of sick patients provides just another reason why the current organ donation system needs to be altered.

Organ donations can be controversial in the minds of potential organ donors due to inhumane activity, dehumanizing processes, or even the circulation of illegal revenue. Conceptual changes need to be made consistent with altruism in order to produce the desired outcome of increasing the availability of desperately needed organs and tissues. Groups such as the mentioned above can act as a resource and clearinghouse mainly focusing on patient’s needs. Organdonor.gov is ran by the Federal Health Resources & Services Administration and can act as ballast providing information geared toward donors such as

Organ trafficking deals with the illegal act of exchanging human organs or tissues at an agreed price. This practice involves mafia networks that collect organs from dead or living persons. A majority of people involved in this illicit business are poverty stricken and so, they see it as a promise of a brighter future. While the World Health Organization (WHO) has defined strict rules, imposed ethical standards along with the absence of any monetary compensation, the trade of organs in the black market has continued to develope ridiculously.

In the US recently the issue of human organ trafficking has become a bigger and bigger problem. When people hear that human organs are being bought and sold on the black market, they think that kind of thing only happens in third world countries, but it is quickly becoming one of America's biggest issues. People spend years of their lives on the transplant list waiting for a life saving operation, and they think that if they just buy whatever they need, it will solve all their problems. What most people don’t understand is how corrupt and dangerous organ trafficking is. The sale of human organs either facilitated through a doctor or on the

Trafficking of organs of human beings is taking place on a daily basis. Individuals at the mercy of organized crime groups are experiencing brutal tactics in the forms of “incarceration, rape, torture and sexual enslavement" (UNRIC, 2014) in order to harvest their organs to meet the supply of organs needed for brokers to sell through an organized nexus of crime (UNRIC, 2014). If the process of legalizing organ sales was initiated and the organ trade had the opportunity to be regulated, the heinous treatment of poor organ donors may cease to exit. The primary goal of regulating the sale of organs internationally would be" to get organized crime out of it, get fair prices and safer practices for donors and safer medical care for recipients"(Leslie,

The first argument of those who oppose payment for living organ donation is that once money is inserted into the issue of organ donation, it possibly creates uncontrollable and unregulated markets in which the poor, who ultimately need money, would be obviously exploited (Delmonico 2004), and in which the human body would become merchandise (Shapiro 20). Opponents point out that the poor are more likely to take any jobs that have a higher risk of death and go against their beliefs in a way they can to get money. Thus, it might be true that they would also be more likely to donate their organs in exchange for payment. Besides, rich individuals are able to abuse that weakness to exploit poor individuals to obtain their organs. However, these claims are highly questionable. When the government bans on the transfer of organs for valuable consideration, the international black markets in organs have been insidiously established and have rapidly developed (Friedman 746). In fact, the practice of those markets defiantly exploits the poor, because most of the organs are usually taken from the poor in indigent Third World countries (Shapiro 20). As an example, kidneys which have come from the poor in some parts of India have been often sold to the wealth in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, the Gulf States, especially, the United Kingdom and the United States (“Illegal Organ Trafficking Poses A Global Problem”). Generally, it is estimated that each year, there are 200 to 300 organs transferred

Organ transfer refers to the process of donation, procurement and transplantation of an organ (Sharp, 2001:112). This practice raises ethical issues and dilemmas concerning the recipient but particularly concerning the donor. In a world where organs are more and more viewed as spare parts that can be gifted away or sold, deceased donors are seen as dehumanized objects that can be fragmented for parts and not as persons (Sharp, 2001). Living donation means a risk of exploitation of marginalized populations who may be pressured to give up their organs due to family or financial conditions (Scheper-Hughes, 2007).

Human trafficking is a serious global issue that needs the awareness and attention of the world. The United Nations Office for Drugs and Crimes identifies human trafficking as “an act of recruiting, transporting, transferring, harboring, or receiving a person through a use of force, coercion, or other means, for the purpose of exploiting them” (UNODC). According to the book Trafficking in People by the policy analysts Clare Ribando Seelke and Alison Siskin, this exploitation can include forced prostitution, ”forced labor and services, slavery, servitude, or the removal of organs” (Ribando Seelke and Siskin 4). Human Trafficking is a violation against fundamental human rights. But even 63 years after the United Nations Universal Declaration

In America at least 3000 African American people go missing every year, never to be found again, not killed, you just don't find them again(http://alkhalife.info/illegal-human-organ-trafficking). That number never goes down, how can you constantly have the same amount of people going missing every year? Are you trying to say the same killers go out and murdered the same people every year, besides too many evidence points their missing to illegal organ trafficking (http://alkhalife.info/illegal-human-organ-trafficking).

The delegate of Russia believes even though some nations like Russia are trying to get rid of organ trafficking, without the uncompromising effort of the other developed nations to ban importing trafficked organs within their own countries, it will be impossible to end this injustice. Developed countries must organize a system that would encourage an increase in legal organ donors, such as the opt-out system which has been successfully introduced in several countries, or reconsider and deregulate the present system on the basis of WHO guidelines. At the same time, laws must be organized to punish illegal trafficking groups in order to protect poor ‘donors’ from being lured into the organ trade.