Are You an Organ Donor?

 Being an organ donor is a noble commitment. To oblige oneself with donating one's organs after death requires a true sense of altruism and compassion for others. Not to mention that the survivors will be obligated to accepting one's wishes to do so. To give, so that others may live is ennobling. However, this exchange of living tissue is transactional. Not intending to sound cold and detached, but organ donation is a multibillion dollar industry. While there are rules and laws, when humans are involved there will be errors, both accidental and intentional. Combining human error with life and death situations is brimming with the possibility of tragedy. Yet it happens...

In most jurisdictions, vital organs are removed only after a formal declaration of death - usually brain death, defined by irreversible loss of brain and brainstem function. This is meant to uphold the "dead donor rule", which requires that organ harvesting must not cause the donor's death. Some ethicists argue that families and donors may not fully understand that brain-dead donors are still alive in some physiological sense, even if legally dead. Donation after 'brain death' is considered 'common medical practice'. 

Another definition of death is "donation after circulatory death". This method is growing in use. Life support is ceased and after the heart permanently stops, usually a 2 - 5 minute waiting period, the organs are harvested. Ethical concerns arise due to the very narrow timing, potential conflicts of interest, and the possibility of misclassifying death. By definition though, this process is 'post-mortem'. 

It's worth noting that China espouses state-sanctioned organ harvesting from prisoners. Credible sources have described execution methods structured to yield high-quality organs before actual death has occurred. Witness testimony has confirmed that doctors have participated in organ procurement before death, essentially making the act of removing the organ the cause of death. 

As I mentioned earlier, since organ donation is transactional, and human error is a possibility, there have been documented cases of tragic reports. A Kentucky man declared brain-dead later showed signs of life during organ retrieval surgery. The procedure was halted and is now under investigation. Investigators found over 70 such near-miss cases in Kentucky alone, and a national review revealed 103 cases of concern. 28 potentially involving organ recovery before death. 

These reports have sparked public outrage, as they well should. The US Department of Health and Human Services is now launching major reforms to ensure that organ procurement only happens after death is definitively and legally confirmed. Even one, singular instance of harvesting vital organs before confirmed death is beyond horrifying. There is actually a man alive today that awoke in a surgical facility and locked eyes with medical practitioners who were about to harvest his vital organs. Unthinkable... While human error in cases where highly trained technicians are involved is rare, it's still possible. Which means there will be cases where error happens. Another case where we have to try to protect ourselves from ourselves...