Return of The Body Snatchers

A vast majority among the medical fraternity frowns
upon harvesting organs, but it is in demand and
the supply is fuelled by an unending flood of green bucks.

But God giveth it a body as it has pleased him and to every
seed his own body. -The Bible

The concept of divinity reposed in man blessed as he is with a body given to him by God, is a theory that is being seriously challenged by modern science. Robert J. White, an American neurosurgeon, has devised a 'blood cooling system' which allows a living head to be severed from one body and attached to another. This probably represents a quantum leap in progressive medicine for quadraplegics but simultaneously it spells blood curdling doom for the less fortunate donors.

Quadraplegics have host bodies that are wasting while their head and brain are normal - like Christopher Reeve, the actor who played Superman before he had a tragic accident that left him a quadraplegic. This new technique, which costs in excess of $56 million, guarantees a severance and reattachment of the old head with a new body, but as the spinal chord cannot be attached, the patient remains a quadraplegic. Assuming that the resources are available and the technique is possible, the question still remains - where does the donor come from? It is the answer to this question that has the medical fraternity squirming. For, within the paradigm of this medical advance lies a dilemma which has at its base, a question of ethics - can a rich but sick person, robfrom a poor but healthy man, his organs for a price?

In the aftermath of the earthquake in Turkey, it was discovered that a fair number of cadavers had been harvested of their kidneys, liver and heart. Apparently, out of the deluge of medical teams that poured into Turkey to help, many were commercial organ trading mafia. When asked to recollect, many local Turkish doctors reported that they never saw these teams actually help anyone. It was more like they were waiting for some-thing. They dressed as medical staff and had very sophisticated equipment which included organ fridge boxes.

The disparity between the poor and the mega-rich is a gap so wide, that to perpetuate their own life even at the cost of another is now quite possible if one has the means. Wealthy patients with terminal illnesses would part with most of their wealth if they could find the fountain of life, but what it translates into in real terms is that someone has to give up an organ for another to get one. It is in this twilight zone that the question of ethical practices raises its ugly head. Most donors of organs are from the Third World - faceless, nameless people who have had their organs harvested for the lure of filthy lucre. Tragic but true.

In many parts of India, Indonesia and the Philippines, one can see a fair number of people from well-known communities with the tell-tale scar of a harvested organ, perhaps one kidney. They are given a pittance by a tout and told that there is no pain and what started as a lark for some pocket money could end in death. Ironic but true. There are specialist hospitals and clinics mushrooming in virtually all super-rich states, where the waiting list for a donor organ is in relation to the wealth of the recipient.

The middlemen and the critical medicos reap the harvest and congratulate themselves on a job well done. The vast majority of the medical fraternity frowns upon harvesting organs but it is in demand and the supply is fuelled by an unending flood of green bucks. Hopefully, it will not be long before strict legislation comes into place the world over, which deals with the dos and the don'ts of organ harvesting. But till then the medical mafia will have a field day, scavenging every time there is a national disaster or an execution.