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Tonya
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 375
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 03:20 am: | 
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Snatched from Anderson Cooper's Blog, warning: Kind of gruesome.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
Ailing Americans seek Chinese organs
There are 90,000 people waiting for organs in the United States. Many of them will die before they ever get close to a transplant. Eric DeLeon of San Mateo, California, did not want to be one of them.
Eric was diagnosed with liver cancer last year. Because he had nine tumors, he was taken off the U.S. transplant list. Doctors considered him a poor candidate for survival.
"I just knew that cancer was going to grow and spread throughout my body and I thought I would be another statistic," Eric told me recently.
So Eric and his wife Lori searched the Internet to check out other transplant options. He found a transplant service in China that promised to find him a healthy liver in a matter of weeks. Eric mortgaged his home and paid $110,000 for a new liver. Two weeks later, he arrived in Shanghai. A couple weeks after that, he had his new liver.
Eric is not alone in looking to China for a new organ. We're told that tens of thousands of foreigners are paying for transplant surgery in China. The problem is those organs may be cut from an executed death row prisoner without consent. That's not all. Some organs are said to have been removed before the prisoner took his last breath in order to keep the organs as fresh as possible.
"I can still hear the sounds of those people shouting when they're having their organs harvested while they are still alive," one former prisoner told me.
You're probably asking yourself by now: How is this allowed to happen?
Well, China executes more prisoners than all other nations combined. More than 4,700 men and women were executed in the last two years, according to Amnesty International. People there can be executed even for white collar crimes like tax fraud, embezzlement and bribery.
The harvesting method is cold and calculating: A single shot to the head if chest organs are needed; a shot to the body if the brain or eyes are needed. Recently, China started using "death vans" where lethal injection is administered on the road so all of the organs can be harvested.
Congressman Chris Smith, a New Jersey Republican, has written a letter to the President of China calling on him to put an end to this practice.
"That smacks of Nazism, when people were reduced to mere commodities that were wanted only for the organs they could provide," Smith told me.
China's deputy health minister acknowledges the organs are harvested from prisoners. But he says they are only harvested from those who give consent.
What constitutes consent? In the United States, death row prisoners are not allowed to donate organs because the government believes they can't freely give consent behind bars.
New York transplant surgeon Thomas Diflo calls what's happening in China a gross violation of human rights. He is refusing to treat people who have had surgery in China. He remembers the first time he heard about this from a patient. "I said, 'Where did you get your organ?' And she said, 'I got it from an executed prisoner.'"
The Chinese government refused our request for an interview, but issued a statement: "The reports about China's random transplant of organs from executed criminals are untrue and a malicious slander against [the] Chinese Judiciary System. ... In China, it is very prudent to use organs from death penalty criminals."
The government promises to change its transplant law July 1 by banning the sale of organs and limiting organ transplants. Critics doubt it will change much of anything for Chinese prisoners.
Posted By Randi Kaye, CNN Correspondent: 7:01 PM ET
http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/anderson.cooper.360/blog/2006/06/ailing-american s-seek-chinese-organs.html |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 6136
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 05:11 am: |
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Tonya,
I know this will sound cruel. But, Hell. They were going kill'em anyway...
*shrugs* |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 2590
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 10:15 am: |
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I wouldn't want such an organ.
Who knows what diseases it carries. And if it does crap out on you who will give a damn (after all you were so low down you took an organ from an executed criminal).
The people who do this will have their reward. |
Ntfs_encryption
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 601
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 02:13 pm: |
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"Who knows what diseases it carries."
Not hardly. They are very careful about organ donors. All they need is one bad one to shut down an operation. I personally know two people who directly work in the field of organ donors. I grilled them very thoroughly about what exactly happens and how organ donations are made and carried out. One actually removes bones, skin, tendons and muscle tissue from bodies that are used for burn victims and people in need of the parts. He told me in great detail what they do. They work under some very strict guidelines. I know this sounds scary and like something out of an Orwellian nightmare, but their recycling or organs does save lives! The ethics of some operations may justifiably deserve scrutiny and questioning but they do save lives!
"And if it does crap out on you who will give a damn...."
Well, that's the chance you take. If you are looking at death, you won't be that fussy about where the organ is coming from.
"(after all you were so low down you took an organ from an executed criminal)."
Oh really? That's what you think, huh? Well, first of all, it you receive an organ, they don't tell you; "Oh by the way, this kidney came from an executed Chinese criminal. Are ya still interested?
"The people who do this will have their reward."
And what reward might that be? Extended life? It's easy to make these moral judgments when it is not you, your child or a loved one who is facing death because of their inability to receive a organ. I have to agree with ABM. It sounds bad but they are going to be put to death regardless. Why let organs go to waste that can give life to others? Because it makes you feel better?
There is nothing that is going to save nor spare the convicted criminals. I'm not encouraging harvesting of organs from criminals, but you are going to have a tough case to prove that it is better to execute and then dispose of these people whose death can give life to others. An Ugly and unpleasant reality, but it is true. It always amazes me how people who are not in the position of others who are facing certain death, to judge them for wanting to live. I personally feel that in the event of my own death, if any parts of my body can be used to extend the life of another person, take what you need. I have requested to be cremated. No need to burn organs that can help others. I carry the organ donator stamp on my driver license. Talk the talk –walk the walk…… E’nuff said.
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Tonya
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 379
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 05:22 pm: |
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Abm, it's been reported that some of these prisoners are completely innocent. And, apparently, many of the ones who aren't completely innocent are being executed (in such a gruesome way) for petty crimes, as stated in the article:
"China executes more prisoners than all other nations combined. More than 4,700 men and women were executed in the last two years, according to Amnesty International. People there can be executed even for white collar crimes like tax fraud, embezzlement and bribery."
And Ntfs,
((("Oh really? That's what you think, huh? Well, first of all, it you receive an organ, they don't tell you; "Oh by the way, this kidney came from an executed Chinese criminal. Are ya still interested?")))
NOT TRUE:
“Diflo is the first American doctor to talk publicly about this experience…
‘To tell you the truth, the original rationale for bringing this situation to the Ethics Committee was my own discomfort in taking care of these patients. I was outraged at the way in which they obtained their organs, and I had a great deal of difficulty separating that fact from the care of the patient," Diflo told the Voice.
Several patients were very up-front and candid about it, that they bought an organ taken from an executed convict for about $10,000," Diflo recalls. "Most of the patients are ecstatic to be off of dialysis, and none has seemed particularly perturbed regarding the source of the organs.’”
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0118,baard,24344,1.html
Don't ask, don't tell?:
http://archives.cnn.com/2001/HEALTH/11/12/ethics.matters/index.html
American ethicist calls for moratorium:
http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-8-10/44668.html |
Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 6140
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 06:08 pm: |
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Chris,
If I'm about to die from renal failure, I'm sure I'd learn to live with some disreputable mofos kidney.
Tonya,
We all die. And I'm sure NONE of those who have and will will believe they deserved to.
As I said to Chris, if some hapless Chinaman's kidney will help keep my a$$ ALIVE, I'm taking it. |
Tonya
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 381
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 06:42 pm: |
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I don't mean to judge but y'all some cold dudes!
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Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 6143
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 - 06:46 pm: |
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Tonya,
What? I'm suppose to DIE because some other mofo did or didn't deserve to? |
Femrenoir
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Femrenoir
Post Number: 98
Registered: 05-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, August 20, 2006 - 02:41 am: |
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The scariest part of this is . . .
China is the fastest growing economy in the world; and
tho the greedy guys frown at China's tactics - they like China's results - Please Lord let them screw up something soon (oh wait a minute . . . that would hurt my stock portfolio - damn!) |
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