Paid Organ Donation - the Grey Basket Concept a S Daar Sultan Qaboos University, Oman, and University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada
J Med Ethics: first published as 10.1136/jme.24.6.365 on 1 December 1998. Downloaded from Journal ofMedical Ethics 1998;24:365-368 Guest editorial Paid organ donation - the Grey Basket concept A S Daar Sultan Qaboos University, Oman, and University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada Few questions in biomedical ethics are as for payment ... it is not necessarily a fault to accept challenging at present as the question of paid it".' The 1997 Bellagio Task Force Report on organ donation for transplantation, raising as it Transplantation, Bodily Integrity and the Inter- does difficult issues related to the body, the soul, national Traffic in Organs,3 found no unarguable property rights, autonomy, limitations to freedom, ethical principle that would justify a ban on the cultural/ethical pluralism and professional versus sale of organs under all circumstances; this is a societal perceptions. The arguments against paid position held by many other secular scholars, for donation are familiar. Here I look at the less example Englehardt,' Sells,5 Dossetor,6 and familiar countervailing arguments. Radcliffe-Richards et al.7 (See reference 8 for a The shortage of organs is getting worse and sig- review).The publication recently in the Lancet of by copyright. nificant numbers of are on a patients dying waiting controversial paper by the International lists. There is fear that as the situation worsens, Forum on unethical behaviour will likely become criminal Tranplant Ethics,7 was greeted by enormous behaviour. Xenotransplantation and tissue engi- international media attention, with a number of neering offer some hope for the future, but at editorials agreeing with the position taken by the present it appears that there are no methods of authors that the debate on organ sales needs to be increasing donation that are not themselves reopened, since pragmatically, at least, more harm seriously controversial.
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