Fear of just that is one reason some people oppose taking organs from condemned criminals. At present, in the US it is illegal to obtain an organ from someone put to death by the state.Simon_Jester wrote:I'm suddenly remembering Larry Niven's "Known Space" stories, where there's an extended period when "organ banks" make transplants very easy by allowing longer-term storage of organs... but the organ banks are filled in large part with organs taken from condemned criminals.
People whose lives depend on a steady stream of spare body parts will always vote to keep the stream flowing. Result? The death penalty becomes much, much more popular.
Correct. It's been about 6 years since I worked down the hall from a major coordination unit for North American transplants, but if I recall correctly even if we moved to presumed consent there would still not be enough organs to fill current demands. It's not enough to die, you have to die in a manner that leaves your organs intact despite you being dead and you have to lack certain pre-existing conditions.Simon_Jester wrote:That might not entirely fix things. Part of the problem is that desirable organs for transplants usually only come from a tiny minority of people: mostly people who die relatively young and healthy.Ralin wrote:Or we could just make organ donation mandatory for everyone.
It might.So it's at least worth asking: if the supply of donor organs increased sharply, but not to an unlimited degree, would demand tend to increase to match supply?
Take kidney transplants, for example – they aren't always necessary to preserve life, dialysis does exist (although it does have some serious problems – then again, so do transplants) but no matter how many deceased donor kidneys are available, no matter how many live donor kidneys are available, no matter how many “pair-exchange” transplants are arranged, the demand never, ever goes down.
Race is not a factor for eligibility, it is a factor for matching. The human leukocyte antigens, which are genetically based, are each statistically more common among some ethnic groups than others. There is also the major histocompatbility complex which is also is a factor in the immune response to transplanted organs, and is also genetically based on genes which, again, vary in different human populations. We are definitely peering over the edge of my world of knowledge here, but it boils down to you are far, far more likely to be able to accept an organ from someone of your ethnic background than someone who isn't of a similar background. Exceptions do exist (largely due to the fact that none of us are purebreds and have someone of dissimilar background in our family trees if you look hard enough) but statistically most donated organs that wind up in black people came from other black people. Actually, African-Americans are more likely to find white matches than immigrants just arrived from Africa, due to the fact most “black” Americans have some white ancestry and thus are slightly more likely to have a HLA and MHC genes matching those most common among white people in the US (who, if their families have been in North American a couple or few centuries, are likewise slightly more likely than fresh European arrivals to find a match outside their race due, again, to interracial crossings in their past.)PainRack wrote:I'm waiting for Lady Tevar to comment since she and hubby has first hand experience on this, but isn't compatibility for a transplant separate from matching for a transplant? Race isn't a factor for whether one is eligible for an organ, albeit, I don't know nuts about heart transplant.Broomstick wrote:There is, of course, the question of bias. Racism and classism isn't supposed to occur in medicine but as medicine is supplied by fallible humans it's a possibility. That doesn't mean it's occurring in this particular case but the question will be raised. The black community is keenly aware that black people are less likely to get organs than white people, but what isn't always understood is that this is an area of medicine where race - or, if you prefer, ethnicity - really does count. Proper organ matching means matching certain compatibility factors and people of the same general descent are more likely to have similar markers. It's not impossible for people of disparate background to be matches but it is much less likely than people of similar background. There are times when a white donor can supply a viable organ for a black (or Asian) recipient but it's much less common than matching with someone of the same race. There are a numerous groups in the US, from major celebrities to individual families, trying to increase organ donation from minorities but the brutal fact remains that simply being a numerical minority reduces your chances of getting a transplant simply because the potential pool of donors is smaller.
So yes, race is a factor and if we want to increase organ transplant as an option for everyone we needs donors from all backgrounds and not just the majority ethnicity. As it stands now, some non-white people in the US are very eligible for organs but wind up dying simply because they don't match the statistical majority of the proper genes and simply never match with an available organ.
Right. Steve Jobs would have been able to access the fastest of private airplanes, one that flew at just under Mach 1, and pay to burn the fuel to get where he needed to be at close to 700 mph. That means he's only 4 hours or less from any point in the contiguous 48 states, and if he hung out in the geographic middle of the country he's only 2 hours away, at most, from any transplant center.Steve Jobs in particular gamed the system by choosing WHICH region had a higher transplant rate and then registering in each one. He has a personal aeroplane of course, all he needs is proof that he can get there within a few hours of being called.The very wealthy - like Dick Cheney - can get on the list within multiple regions because, in addition to simply being able to afford (through either good insurance or personal wealth) a transplant they can also afford to charter a personal air ambulance to meet a new organ halfway. The more regions you can register in the better you odds of getting a new organ.
Yeah, that changes the odds. Ask Lady Tevar how long it will take for her to get Nitram to HIS transplant center when the get the call...