Stolen Kidneys? Desperate for an Organ Transplant
By: Nancy | January 31, 2008 | Category: Health
It's a story I've heard around the internet for years: unsuspecting people are abducted and anesthetized. When they come to, they find that one of their kidneys has been surgically removed. Til now, it was dismissed as an urban legend.
But this week, the story proved true as law enforcement near New Delhi broke up a ring that reportedly tricked more than 500 poor Indian workers over the last decade into going to a particular address in search of a job. When they got there, they were knocked out and awakened later to find that they had stitches in their side and were missing a kidney. The surgeon who is thought to have performed all those operations is now on the run. And at a guest house owned by the doctor, police found five wealthy foreigners awaiting transplants, including two Americans.
Reports like this are really horrifying. And they sure highlight the lengths that people will go to, to get a new chance at life with an organ transplant.
This morning, more than 98,000 people in the US were on waiting lists, hoping to receive a donated organ. Seventy-five percent were waiting for a kidney.
It's hard to think about becoming an organ donor because most often, organ donation happens following death. But hearing stories about lives being restored through transplants made the decision to register as a donor a little easier for me.
If you're healthy and meet certain other criteria, you can donate a kidney, part of your liver or parts of other organs right now, and continue to live a normal, healthy life. Donating tissue like bone marrow is just an outpatient procedure. And it could mean the difference in someone's survival.
OrganDonor.gov and DonateLife.net have lots of information to answer your questions about organ donation from practical and moral perspectives. And OrganDonor.gov has links to information on how you can register in your state to donate. Many states make it really easy; they have a place you can check on your driver's license application to register as a donor.
What are your thoughts about organ donation? Are you a registered donor? Do you know anyone who's received a transplant?
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