The Consequences Of An Opt-Out System

In this society, organ transplant surgery has been perfected to where no risk is present. However, organs still have a high demand with low supply. In addition, the only people eligible to receive organs are those who came to their ailment at no fault of their own. In other words, they did not smoke, drink, or eat in manners that caused their diseased organs. The people who donate organs have to be perfectly healthy as well to eliminate unhealthy organs for donation.

A continuing problem exists in trying to close the gap between the supply and demand of procured organs in the United States. An increase in the amount of transplant operations performed has risen significantly over time. As a result, a new name is added to the national waiting list every 16 minutes (Duan, Gibbons, & Meltzer, 2000). It is estimated that about 100,000 individuals are on the national transplant waiting list at all times (Munson, 2012). Something needs to be done before these numbers get completely out of control. Despite the introduction of Gift of Life and many other educational efforts, the United

The decision to determine who gets an organ is something that cannot be taken lightly. If proper protocol is not followed, issues such as biasness and judging people based on factors like socioeconomic status may be used to determine this dilemma. For this reason, organ transplantation is overseen by government regulators. The Division of Transplantation (DoT), which falls under the US Department of Health and Human Services, oversees this process. Organs are allocated according to strict rules that take into account physical matching, tissue and blood type matching, medical criteria, waiting time, severity of illness. The allocation system is blind to name, race, sex and wealth. The allocation rules have been developed over many years of deliberation by physicians and other transplant professionals, transplant candidates and recipients, donor families, and representatives of the federal government. (CITE ThIs) Removing these variables and following protocol causes the medical professional to make a decision on fairness rather than feelings, biasness, and possibly corruption such as bribery.

In most countries that use this system, families or a close friend would still be informed and their opinion would be taken into account, Spain being a good example of a country that uses the so called soft opt-out system, there system lets the family play a big part in decision making at the time of death and their views are taken into account, this seems to work well for them as they have the highest number of donors with 33 deceased organ donors per million population. Eurobarometer European and Organ donation (2007),

One of the areas that is currently affecting the United States is the ethical issue of organ transplant allocation. Since the first single lung transplant in 1983 and then the first double lung transplant in 1986 there have been thousands of people who have lived because of the surgery. One must examine, evaluate, and apply the four ethical principles to Organ transplant allocation to look at the ethical issues involved. Once must look at the fact that not every patient who would benefit from a transplant will receive one in time

The shortage of organ transplants has been an ongoing crisis for years; the growing list of patients awaiting transplants has no end in sight, and the number of people dying while they waste away on the waiting list is not going to go down unless something changes.Society has turned away from alternatives to our archaic organ donation program, but there are other options available.The transplant community and society as a whole need to step back and rethink--to adopt a more open-minded views on organs as a resource in order to save lives and make meaningful changes to the national transplant program.

Organ transplantation is a term that most people are familiar with. When a person develops the need for a new organ either due to an accident or disease, they receive a transplant, right? No, that 's not always right. When a person needs a new organ, they usually face a long term struggle that they may never see the end of, at least while they are alive. The demand for transplant organs is a challenging problem that many people are working to solve. Countries all over the world face the organ shortage epidemic, and they all have different laws regarding what can be done to solve it. However, no country has been able to create a successful plan without causing moral and ethical dilemmas.

Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Nova Scotia follow the opt-out model whereby all members of a class are part of the class action by default and must elect to opt-out if they do not wish to be a class member . This allows for the certification of mandatory national opt-out classes. Under Ontario’s Class Proceedings Act, section 9 provides that any class member involved in a class proceeding may opt out of the proceeding in the manner and within the time specified in the certification order, and subsections 27(2) and (3) provides that a judgment on common issues of a class binds every class member who has not opted out of the class proceeding and does not bind a person who has opted out of the class

The current system of acquiring an organ donation is through a wait-list called the allocation system, which was supposed to be resolute. However, there are a few exceptions to the wait list causing this entire system to become even more unfair. For instance, when an organ donor dies his or her organs are more likely to be given to family members on a wait-list rather than those who are actually next in line (Hanto). Wait-lists are meant to be fair because those put on the list first are supposed to get organs first, but how fair is that really? How badly one needs an organ for his or her survival should rank higher than how quickly he or she found about his or her physical defects. Another factor that should be taken into account when placing people onto a wait list is their age. It makes more sense to give younger people a chance at life than prolonging the life of someone who has already lived to a ripe old age, but most supporters of the allocation system will argue that all lives are worth the same, even though there are clear lines between who will benefit more from organ donations.

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).

Innovative advances in the practice of medicine have increased the life span of the average American. This along with the growing population in the United States and has created a shortfall in the number of organs available for transplant today. The current system of allocation used to obtain organs for transplant faces difficulty because of two primary reasons according to Moon (2002). The two perceptions that stop potential organs donors are that the allocation criteria is unfair and favors certain members of society and/or that organs may be allocated to someone who has destroyed their organs by misuse (Moon, 2002). Many individuals decline to donate organs because anyone requiring an organ transplant is placed on a waiting list and it is possible that individuals who have destroyed their organs by their own actions or convicted criminals could receive donated organs before someone whose organs are failing through no fault of their own and positively contribute to society. When a celebrity or wealthy individual requires a transplant they are often viewed as "jumping" the waitlist but

In the United States today, people lose their lives to many different causes. Though this is tragic, there are also a large group of people who could benefit from these deaths; and those people are people in need of an organ transplant. Although a sudden or tragic death can be heart breaking to a family, they could feel some relief by using their loved ones' organs to save the lives of many others. This act of kindness, though, can only be done with consent of both the victim and the family; making the donation of organs happen much less than is needed. The need for organs is growing every day, but the amount provided just is not keeping up. Because of the great lack of organ donors, the constant need for organs,

In February 2003, 17-year-old Jesica Santillan received a heart-lung transplant at Duke University Hospital that went badly awry because, by mistake, doctors used donor organs from a patient with a different blood type. The botched operation and subsequent unsuccessful retransplant opened a discussion in the media, in internet chat rooms, and in ethicists' circles regarding how we, in the United States, allocate the scarce commodity of organs for transplant. How do we go about allocating a future for people who will die without a transplant? How do we go about denying it? When so many are waiting for their shot at a life worth living, is it fair to grant multiple organs or multiple

When medical professionals create organ allocation policies, their main decision comes down to a simple question: should their policies place a higher emphasis on equity or efficiency? Policies emphasizing efficiency primarily aim to avoid wasting organs. Although the definition of “waste” varies, efficiency advocates discourage allocation to those estimated to die soon, such as the elderly, or those who have caused their own disease. Pro-equity advocates tend to consider such judgments of value biased and unfair. Policies emphasizing equity are concerned with fairness in the allocation process: assuring the criteria remain unbiased towards any one group (e.g. race, sex, age, sexual orientation, etc.). Opening up the use of “worth” as a criterion leaves room for human bias. Fortunately, the United Network for Organ Sharing continuously reviews and modifies organ allocation policies within the United States.

As of November 30th, 2017, 116,080 people formed the organ transplant waiting list. On average, twenty people on this list will die today. The number of people that need an organ transplant continues to grow; every ten minutes a new name is added to the list. According to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, “only 3 in 1,000 people die in a way that allows for organ donation” (“Organ Donation Statistics”). In order for a deceased person to give organs, the organs must still be alive to donate. Organ transplantation improved greatly over the last century, but with an insufficient amount of organs available, it limits breakthroughs. In essence, new methods need to replace the unavailable organs. These methods drastically improve the process of organ transplantation, and in the future, the overall humans well-being.