This was an interesting question initially focussed on the powers of the Welsh assembly but which quickly focussed on presumed consent. The issue is whether presumed consent would be more effective than a publicity campaign in increasing the number of donors.
Having listened to the arguments especially about the influence of the deceased family members I think I am coming down on the side of a publicity campaign.
You can read the exchange here:
Any views?
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201011/ldhansrd/text/110323-0001.htm#11032365000801
It’s morally wrong to assume the state owns your body parts.
If you accept the utilitarianism argument, then we should be killing off people because of the benefit it brings. Heart, Lung, 2 kidneys, corneas, … Topping someone brings lots of benefits.
It’s the same with assuming that you have a right to someone’s body after they died. Unless you have permission you don’t.
Looking at the numbers increasing the number of people on the register is an irrelevance.
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7,759 people are still waiting for transplants.
2,021 donated.
Half were live donors.
http://www.organdonation.nhs.uk/ukt/statistics/statistics.jsp
Number of people on the register – 17 million.
Very simply, you can’t close the gap with increasing the number of people on the register.
You can only close the gap by asking more relatives at the time of death, and/or increasing the number of deaths to get suitable donors.
As for the moral argument, presumed consent or presumed opt out should go.
Everyone should opt in or opt out, make an active choice, on their driving license application or renewal, and its their choice. Not the states.
Who, what body-of-expertise=wisdom that is, is best qualified, experienced, and in-position, to approve/deny an organ-transplant (qua ‘donation’) ?
The deceased’s “family”, I should say, would not have such qualification and experience, nor ‘positioning’ vis a vis the ‘big-picture’; and should be relegated downwards in influence.
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I do not understand ramifications such as “presumed consent”.
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However, whilst studying Philosophy under Monash University I met the introductory Formal-Argumentation & Moral-Reasoning problem of:
A busy surgical-hospital has just admitted an indispensable world-leader into one operating-theatre where s/he is awaiting a vital-organ replacement (say, a heart);
meanwhile in the adjacent theatre lies a convicted murderer and violent-robber needing life-saving surgery close to the heart;
your task, should you choose to accept it, is to decide whether a tiny risk-inclusive or accidental ‘slip’ of the surgeon’s scalpel, or of the aneasthetist’s wrist, in the criminal’s theatre resulting in the immediate decease of the said multiple-criminal and in an immediate availability of a good strong healthy heart, justifies or makes-acceptable a quick-transplant into the dying form of the world-irreplaceable leader in the next-door operating theatre.
…….
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1115Th24Mar11.JSDM.
Presumed consent ? NO ! Not in a million years. As a parent if, God forbid, anything happened to my child (of any age) and I wasn’t available and the hospital presumed consent there would be hell to pay.
There is no trust in Trusts and people are more of the mind that should an accident happen in a lower class person that doctors do infact see them as fields of harvest.
The law requires specific consent to sex let alone taking a kidney or a couple of eyeballs.
Furthermore, we have to go deeper,into how much of
human-life,
human-needs/activities/”rights”,
is “Private” or
“Individual”;
and how much is “In Common”.
The answer(I think being practically self-evident) derives from the overarching and underpinning bigger-answer “All Life is In Common”;
so every human-life is “In Common”.
There is at root no such justifiable thing as a “private individual life”;
and it will all depend upon what you mean by “a private organ” as to how we manage this whole Matter of Organ-Transplantation;
and until we have settled those deepest levels, don’t even think about “donation”, “consent”, “family’s rights”, and strings of other pseudo- and micro- “Needs”.
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1309Th24Mar11.JSDM.
Of course, there are valid reasons to debate this but presumed consent should not be the preferred option. My main reason is simply that the family, or guardians, will normally know of any preference previously expressed by the deceased and will certainly know the person far better than any medical staff hovering over the body.
From Burke and Hare to Bristol Royal Infirmary, surgeons have been caught with illegally harvested body parts. There is a lingering distrust from the public towards surgeons in this matter which must first be addressed. I suggest they stop using the word ‘harvest’ as a first step.
The question of a market/trade in human organs calls in to perspective whether there should be a publicity campaign or presumed consent at all.
What is the cost or value of a human kidney in the market place, outside the NHS monopoly?
For a monopolistic organization to have any powers over the organs of a patient is quite wrong.
As an anecdote: I met a man of 28 who told me he was going to have all his limbs amputated and then donate his organs.
I saw him over the next three or four years.
He had his limbs amputated one by one.
He gave his internal organs to the NHS.
ANY SYSTEM WHICH PERMITS SUCH CRIMINAL ACTS
WITHIN ITS BOUNDS, IS A THOROUGHLY BAD SYSTEM.
That is the NHS and its campaigning for human organs.
It ends Clive Soley, with a master race and a race bred exclusively for its replacement organs!
You support any of it at all?
your task, should you choose to accept it, is to decide whether a tiny risk-inclusive or accidental ’slip’ of the surgeon’s scalpel, or of the aneasthetist’s wrist, in the criminal’s theatre resulting in the immediate decease of the said multiple-criminal and in an immediate availability of a good strong healthy heart, justifies or makes-acceptable a quick-transplant into the dying form of the world-irreplaceable leader in the next-door operating theatre.
The most salient remark Miles JSD has made for a long time.
The question of a market/trade in human organs calls in to perspective whether there should be a publicity campaign or presumed consent at all.
What is the cost or value of a human kidney in the market place, outside the NHS monopoly?
For a monopolistic organization to have any powers over the organs of a patient is quite wrong.
As an anecdote: I met a man of 28 who told me he was going to have all his limbs amputated and then donate his organs.
I saw him over the next three or four years.
He had his limbs amputated one by one.
He gave his internal organs to the NHS.
ANY SYSTEM WHICH PERMITS SUCH CRIMINAL ACTS
WITHIN ITS BOUNDS, IS A THOROUGHLY BAD SYSTEM.
That is the NHS and its campaigning for human organs.
It ends Clive Soley, with a master race and a race bred exclusively for its replacement organs!
You support any of it at all?
“All Life is In Common”
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Down the local spare parts shop with you then.
No objection?
Rather than choosing between presumed consent or the status quo, why not ask everyone to make a decision and keep it on file? Then there need be no presumption one way or another, and everyone’s wishes are respected. This could be a compulsory part of electoral registration forms, for example. Two tick boxes, yes or no. There should be no shame attached to choosing one or the other, but it has to be completed or else the form is returned.
The other issue I have with the system of consent for organ donation is that relatives of the deceased have to be consulted. Others have said that the NHS don’t own their body parts; but neither do their relatives. If someone is on a register indicating a wish one way or the other, their relatives should not be consulted about it at all. There is an issue of relatives not respecting the deceased person’s wishes, but more importantly, even the most well-meaning family members are likely to be upset and not in the right state of mind to make such a decision, and nor should they be put though having to be asked the question by medical staff. It’s far better to use the decision made when the deceased was alive and well and of a sound mind to make their own choice.
Have you read “The Ghoul Squad” by Harry Harrison? It’s a short story dating back to 1968. That was a story based on the concept of an assumed opt-in and a quick-reaction squad to descend on a death scene and harvest organs for transplant.
I recall a chapter from a pre-publication conservative green notebook headed “Humans At Last Can Earn-Their-Keep, After Death”
in which a much more “Think globally – Act locally” economical method for cadaver-disposal, than burial-into-the-ocean-depths (for the fishes to carry on replenishing our 7-course dinners out of),
or sacramental-distributing-of-all-body-parts among the vultures-population atop a mountain (for a whole life-ecosystem to thrive from),
for disposal of the dead,
would be
“…to curtail the encroachment of human-corpses across valuable land and soil (churchyards), and to become better-lifesupportive towards the Lifesupports we humans have to keep culling, by constructing a state-of-the-art cadaver-life-recycling unit, in the form of a Special Livestock Farm wherein proper processing could be provided for other-lifesupports’ lifesupports, including for already environmentally-non-invasive food-resources, such as the domestic-suidae-family, to feed upon and enjoy and grow to food-production size, as in the case of the Sus they have advanced to be able to do simply upon concrete” …
“This would also obviate human-civilisational destructivities such as Cremation by Expensive Artificial Fire.
(The latter is not to be confused with “Friendly-Fire” which although tantamount to Blasphemy could become on the contrary more acceptable on a greater-than-human Life-Web Scale)… “).
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The then local English vicar when appraised of this document was heard to hiss through clenched teeth “That’s Evil “.
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But I confess, “organ donation”, being as but the tip of an iceberg, is as complex a topic as “throwing the dead overboard” or “ploughing unmarketed farm-crops back into the ground”.
I think the whole field of “organ-transplantation” needs far deeper, far plainer, dispassionate, and transparent analysis, and mind-mapping, than perhaps does the NHS itself;
or possibly than does the Current Arabic-World Warrings, one human-organs-management ‘weapon’ of which remains the intention of millions of Arabs to “chop-up every Israeli into little pieces and throw them in to the Mediterranean Sea”.
0853St26Mar11.JSDM.
All Life is In Common”
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Down the local spare parts shop with you then.
No objection?
It looks as though objections to organ transplant and donating is almost unanimouse with correspondents, who do tend to be the screaming extremist types, myself not necessarily excluded, but it surely highlights the problem of the state organizing everything in such a way that the needs of the individual are completely ignored in the interests of misconceived Socialism or State Enterprise.
The Ghoul Squad has moved on much further.
Thanks for the book reading recommendation.
The Lord Alf moris was only recently campaigning for compensation for people who drank human blood and caught HIV from contaminated “doses”. Since he was witless enough to continue campaigning for it, in spite of being non quorate the first time round, and withdrawing the Bill, the bill has probably been passed by now, to COMPENSATE
those who PARTOOK of a HUMAN ORGAN, (The Blood) and then found that it maimed or killed them.
If that does not take the cake and the biscuit as well, I don’t know what does.
The syringe! the syringe is the first penetration of the human body in the hospital; and if you agree to it, there is not much they can not get on with after that.
Don’t let ’em touch you!
“screaming extremist types”
Certainly been a fair bit of soul searching wondering if I am as insane as the rest lately but “extremist” ??? Not sure I’d warrant being called extreme for having strong objections to presumed consent or many other things politicians seem to think ok, whilst the majority state clearly no it isn’t.
Nutter? Maybe but extreme, well I suppose it depends on your definition and the Government you are saying “no” to.
You have Enthymemised, Lord Blagger;
kindly show the connections between your individual-human-life, all-Life, and your (“)spare body-parts shop (“).
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Nonetheless, I feel your ‘snapshot’ repartee to be quite pungently cogent
(if as just aforesaid, being of hidden relevance/irreverence).
It quantum-catapults us straight from a universal Commonalty of Life into an existential “spare parts shop”, for the wholesale cannibalisation of wholesome and living humans’ body organs, limbs, blood, and fragments-of-flesh-and-bone !
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Look you, try this one on for size also, then:
“Life is inherently a Complexity of Conflicts and Killings”.
( … start analysing and mind-map-synthesising both statements)
Your double-barreled task should you choose to shoulder it is to clearly dichotomise and mind-map these above two principle-truths:
(1) All Life is In-Common.
(2) Life is inherently a Complexity of Conflicts and Killings.
for example, describe your civilisation’s values-scaling, stages, and processings, of Life (on Earth)
instantiate, such as
“an earthworm stranded and slowly ‘drowning’ or ‘baking’ on a human-civilisation concrete path may be (should be) left there to die;
whereas a human-being lying there “must” be immediately rescued, ambulanced to the nearest hospital, and spoon-fed”.
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You need to give me more choices than mere “Any objection?”.
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0727St26Mar11.JSDM.
It is latter day cannibalism.
Not based on tracing all one’s ancestors back to the year dot, in order to become one of the sacred few gene-alogically, but tracing gene-tically to ensure compatibility.
As far as Blood donation is concerned they are not too fussy about the genetic types since the body manufactures its own as soon and rejects ( by elimination) the “transplanted” blood.
All blood donors are taking the first step of donating part of the human “organ”, blood.
Put the knives away I say, and that includes the blood drawing syringe.
I’d probably be all-for some liberally-regulated and welfare-state-ised
gene-tickle-alley-tea …
1050Sn27Mar11.jsdm.
Carl H.
Nutter extremist etc.
Carl H.
Nutter extremist laugh! laugh!
It’s morally wrong to assume the state owns your body parts.
(Blagger)
And yet it might once you have signed the form for the use of a hypodermic syringe, usually for the relief of pain, in an A+E department.
In fact if a motorcyclist has had a bad accident, it is the first question they ask.
(organ donors on wheels), and it is not because they are planning to GIVE him/her organs either.
If someone has donated their organs in their lifetime, and registered their wish, then family must take a back seat. For otherwise there is no point to the register in the first place.
However, if a person has not registered their wish to donate, to press families into such an act is ghoulish. Especially when it involves the death of a child.
Had they not registered a desire to donate, I would not allow anyone to remove the organs of my beloved under any circumstances.
There is far more to organ transplant than presently discussed. Often the organs they transfer are diseased. Some have cancer.
Then there is the spiritual aspect.
http://hubpages.com/hub/Cellular-Memories-in-Organ-Transplant-Recipients
http://www.alternative-doctor.com/mind_stuff/cellmemory.html
A far better way to give people the opportunity to go on living forever is, a grow your own organ bank. Have a storage freezer filled with our body parts grown from our own stem cells. No problem with rejection, perfect match, no possibility of personality changes from a donor part, disease free and so on.
Yes, it isn’t possible, yet, so we have to wait then don’t we?