Organ Donations
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Assignment A
1.
Your life was over. Did you have any regrets? 27-years old Jo Keeling didn’t. She was an organ
donor, and when she suffered from a brain haemorrhage, her kidneys were saved and given to
a young girl who suffered without. But frankly not many people sign up for organ donation.
Many don’t because of their religious beliefs. Others just because of the fact they don’t think
about it in the everyday. That’s why the British doctor Sir Liam Donaldson would like to make
a dramatic change. He wants to change the system so instead of opt-in you have to opt-out,
which means instead of signing up for organ donation, you’ll have to sign out. This proposal
received a very mixed reception; at the BMA it was a success, while the Patients’ Association
though bad of it. Spain has already introduced it, and it has been highly successful. They have
doubled their rates on organ donations since switching in to the opt-out program.
But the opt-out program isn’t flawless. One of the issues could be that the doctors wouldn’t
give the patients a fair chance for survival, because of the damage it would cost on the useful
organs. This is a huge ethical problem. Isn’t it better to take a kidney from a brain damage
patient, who has just been exposed to a car accident and who has no clue at all of the situation
she/he is in, and give it to a person who can’t survive with out, and who is perfectly aware of
the situation?
2.
The problem is growing, but luckily there are progressing solutions. One of them is the
previously mentioned opt-out instead of -in suggestion, which means, that people would have
to sign out of organ donation, instead of in. This would make every one aware of organ
donation and encourage people to decide whether they want to be a part of it or not.
Selling your kidney is in most countries banned. But a British political and economic news
magazine, have come up with a suggestion which will shorten if not eliminate the waiting lists.
In 2006, 4.039 people died from a kidney disease while waiting for the transplantation. This
could have been avoided, if the governments around the world would allow selling organs or
introduced the opt-out program. But all these arguments sound so fine and noble, and you
might wonder why we haven’t done it already if it saves so many lives. But actually some
people are against organ donation, because of their religion. Jehovah witnesses are against all