Word: organisms
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Many have become fed up with the lack of organ donors in this country and want to institute changes to increase their number. Up to now, education has been the preferred method of increasing donations in the United States. Although many Americans understand the need for organ donors, they have not acted according to those beliefs...
Discounting those fundamentally opposed to organ donation, a large number of Americans seems to suffer from apathy. In a survey done by UNOS in 1991, 79 percent of the respondents did not object to organ donation, but only 39 percent said they were actually listed as potential organ donors. In elections, apathy can result in skewed outcomes; in the case of organ donations, apathy can result in hundreds of lives lost that might otherwise have been saved...
...combat this problem, people have tried to jump the gun and introduce many ways of promoting organ donation. Several of these solutions are quite drastic and far-reaching, even to the point of changing the Constitution. Three methods include compensation for donations, non-monetary compensation for donation and presumed consent. Unfortunately, these methods have not been shown to work. There are problems with each, should they ever come to be implemented...
Monetary compensation for donation is ethically wrong. It asks people to sell their body parts for money. The idea of setting a price for as invaluable a gift as an organ is morally reprehensible. It leads to fears about the wealthy procuring organs much faster and leaving the poor at an incredible disadvantage. Also, this method has been tried in Third World nations. The chaos it has created in Egypt with a black market for organs should steer other countries away from trying...
Should the U.S. ever implement this program, it would first have to change present laws by which paying for organs is illegal. If monetary compensation not only tarnishes the practice of organ donations but also is unsuccessful where it has been employed, it should have no place...