Word: kidney
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...mayors, a prominent real-estate developer and several rabbis. But amid the bribery and money-laundering allegations, the element of the sweeping sting that grabbed the most attention was the accusation that Levy Izhak Rosenbaum, a New York City resident, had tried to orchestrate the sale of a human kidney for $160,000. The black-market kidney trade is a growing problem - the World Health Organization estimates that organ-trafficking accounts for 5% to 10% of all kidney transplants worldwide. So how do kidney sales work...
...organ market is largely made up of impoverished and desperate sellers, wealthy, ailing customers and predatory middlemen. Most sales take place in developing countries, where a kidney can often be purchased for the price of a high-end TV. In Iran - the only country in the world where organ sales are legal - a healthy kidney retails for about $6,000. The going rate is less than half that amount in India, which has an abundance of doctors capable of performing the procedure and destitute masses often unable to raise cash any other way. In January 2008, police busted an organ...
Buying or selling a kidney in the U.S. is much more difficult, not least because there are easier ways to make a buck. Selling organs has been illegal since 1984, and is punishable by five years in prison and a $50,000 fine. Even if breaking the law doesn't deter you, it's difficult to hoodwink a doctor into believing that a fraudulent organ donor's motives are purely altruistic. U.S. hospitals run donor-recipient couples through a series of interviews, including a meeting with a social worker, who checks to make sure that no money is exchanging hands...
...enough to withstand a four-hour operation. You must be free of disease - HIV, hepatitis or cancer will disqualify you - and, of course, you need to have the same blood type as the recipient. It takes an average of three months for hospitals to assess and approve a transplant. Kidney donation is a major commitment - you can't drive or lift anything for six weeks, and it can be over a month before you're ready to return to work. (See pictures of crime in Middle America...
...That meant taking up the pardon question again was, as a West Wing veteran put it later, like passing a kidney stone - for the second time. Bolten declined to take a stand, according to several associates. Instead, he lateraled the issue to Fielding, claiming that a legal, not a political, call was required. If the counsel's office decided a pardon wasn't merited, says an official involved in the discussions, everyone else would have cover with Cheney. "They could say, Our hands are tied - our lawyers said the guy was guilty." (See the top 10 unfortunate political one-liners...