Currently in the United States, the human body defines a profitable site of “reusable” parts, which range from whole organs down to microscopic tissues. Although the medical practices that facilitate the transfer of parts from one human body to another reduce suffering and extend lives, these practices have also altered perceptions of the values assigned to the body. The practices shaping American biomedicine are seen as pervasive, and sometimes destructive, compelling scientific inquiry and social critique.
http://www.king5.com/news/Death-row-inmate-wants-to-donate-organs-117762369.html
This video (and the related article) raises ethical, legal, medical, and social issues. Should “one of Oregon’s most notorious killers” be allowed to end appeals to his death sentence in order to donate his organs? Christian Longo, the “notorious killer”, thinks so, he wants to alter his protocol for lethal injection to fulfill his wish. Longo was convicted of killing his wife and three children in 2003, in which he stated he did so “in order to live an uninhibited lifestyle”. Longo’s issue to donate his organs was recently brought to recent news with submission of his Op-Ed piece, “Giving Life After Death Row”, in the New York Times. Longo writes, “I spend 22 hours a day locked in a 6 foot by 8 foot box on Oregon’s death row. There is no way to atone for my crimes, but I believe that a profound benefit to society can come from my circumstances. I have asked to end my remaining appeals, and then donate my organs after my execution to those who need them. But my request has been rejected by the prison authorities”. In addition to Longo admitting his guilt, he has founded a group called “Gifts of Anatomical Value From Everyone, or G.A.V.E.”. This is an organization set up to “make a difference in the organ shortage in the U.S. with the help of willing and healthy volunteer prisoners. Prisoners frequently ask to help whether through living kidney donations or multiple donations after execution to anyone in need. But they are just as frequently denied unnecessarily by prison administration and transplant authorities”. In his Op-Ed piece, Longo argues, “According to the United Network for Organ Sharing, there are more than 110,000 Americans on organ waiting lists. Around 19 of them die each day. There are more than 3,000 prisoners on death row in the United States, and just one inmate could save up to eight lives by donating a healthy heart, lungs, kidneys, liver and other transplantable tissues”. Furthermore, Longo claims, “If I donated all of my organs today, I could clear nearly 1 percent of my state’s organ waiting list. I am 37 years old and healthy; throwing my organs away after I am executed is nothing but a waste”. The current procedure for those on death row in Oregon, along with other states, requires death by three lethal drugs injected, which destruct organs and make them unfit for transplants. In the video, Longo suggests an appeal to switch to one lethal drug that would kill him, and simultaneously allow his organs to be saved and donated. However, the state has denied his request, claiming his requests to change his death row appeal and change the lethal injection protocol are mutually exclusive. His requests raise many issues of concern, such as logistical and health concerns. A common concern involves the prevalence of disease, such as increased rates of H.I.V. and hepatitis in the prison population, which can effect the prisoner’s organs. However, tests can be administered to determine whether the prisoner’s organs are healthy. Another concern is on fears about security; the donation of organs by prisoners can be seen as an “elaborate escape scheme”. However, it is argued that prisoners do receive other medical care at outside hospitals and are executed on prison grounds, meaning that donating does not produce the risk of escape. Additionally, there is public apprehension towards prisoners donating organs due to the previously publicized case of “Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi released two sisters who had been sentenced to life in prison”. By donating organs, in this previous case, a kidney of one sister to the other, provides an expectation that prisoners can receive privileges and reductions in their sentences, and might be given the option to leave prison alive. Lastly, there is the concern of abuse. The acceptance of voluntary donations provides the opportunity to abuse these choices, which has been demonstrated by past history of medical experiments on prison inmates. However, it is argued that prisoners should be allowed to initiate a request to donate their organs without any “enticements”. Longo claims that many other men on death row express the wish to donate their organs, as well. Does the public, especially those in need of organ transplants, disagree with the prison authority’s response in denying Longo’s request? Or do they express the many concerns surrounding organ donations by prisoners? Who is to decide if a prisoner on death row can or cannot donate their organs?
Organs are rapidly becoming commodities, in which American attitudes towards life and death are modified. In the article, “Aged bodies and kinship matters: The ethical field of kidney transplant”, the authors discuss how modern medicine defines “death within a framework of ethical decision making that emphasizes the fight against specific moral diseases and conditions” (Kaufman et al. 81).The authors argue that the ultimate decision of morality is "a sacrifice of the wholeness of the body and a nonreciprocal bargain”, in which “the possibility of receiving the body part of another- the always already quality of this social fact- becomes part of the calculus by which the potential risk to another life and the sacrifice of another’s bodily integrity are weighed in relation to the value of extending one’s own life and improving one’s own well being” (Kaufman et al. 83-85). As a result, “the availability of interventions as therapeutic possibilities elicits hopes for and expectations of cure, restoration, enhancement and improved quality of life” (Kaufman et al. 83). The article discusses how effective procedures “become routine and thus expected and desired by clinicians, patients, and families”, additionally, ”when techniques become less invasive and associated with lower mortality risk, consumer demand for them and ethical pressure to make them available both increase" (Kaufman et al. 82). As time has evolved, new ways of seeing medicine have been established, as the authors state, “Just as the sonogram opened ways of seeing the fetus, its malformations, and the idea of pre-birth intervention, just as surrogacy opened up the idea of motherhood and family, and just as cardiac surgery, the mechanical ventilator, and emergency CPR changed ways of thinking about the risk of death, so, too, the idea of organs moving from children to parents, between spouses, or between friends or strangers opens up the old issue of social and familial obligation to emerging biotechnical means of expression”(Kaufman et al. 95). Medical and technological advances, in particular organ donation, have created new alternatives to defeating death and viewing life, which in turn, have produced ethical and moral issues concerning obligation and choice.
Nancy Scheper-Hughes' article, “The Last Commodity: Post-Human Ethics and the Global Traffic in ‘Fresh’ Organs”, discusses the ethics of organ transplants and the “moral and ethical gray zone- the lengths to which it is permissible to go in the interests of saving or prolonging one’s own life at the expense of diminishing another person’s life or sacrificing the cherished cultural and political values” (147). Our sense of “body holism, integrity, and human dignity” are restricted by “free market medicine” which “requires a divisible body with detachable and demystified organs seen as simple materials for medical consumption” (Scheper-Hughes 155). Additionally, “the transformation of a person into a life that must be prolonged or saved at any cost has made life into the ultimate commodity fetish. The belief in the absolute value of a single human life saved or prolonged at any cost ends all ethical inquiry and erases any possibility of a global social ethic” (Scheper-Hughes 158). As these medical transactions take place “from black and brown bodies to white ones, and from females to males”, there is “little empathy for the donors, living and brain dead. Their suffering is hidden from the general public. Few organ recipients know anything about the impact of the transplant procedure on the donor’s body” (Scheper-Hughes 150,161). “Social kinship” produced by the supply of organs is created to “link strangers, even at times political enemies from distant locations who are described by the operating surgeons as 'a perfect match--like brothers'” (Scheper-Hughes 150). The obligation to prolong and save the life of another person outweighs the medical risks of surgery or later impacts that may affect the donor’s life later on. It has become a choice to become an organ donor and help save the lives of others, thus moral and ethical issues accompany the choices and/or obligations of organ transplant patients and organ donors.
Our limitations concerning the notions of life and death have changed with the advancement of medicine and technology. Our values of the body are modified through time, as health becomes one of the main concerns of our society. We have become bounded within the framework of biomedicine and the surrounding issues of choice as one seeks to defer death and prolong life. Such ethical and moral concerns concerning organ transplants promote the progress and promise of extending human life. Has the hope to maximize human life extended far beyond what nature has intended? Medicine, science, and technology have already increased the human life span, so what’s next?
Sources:
Sharon R. Kaufman, Ann J. Russ, and Janet K. Shim. 2006. “Aged Bodies and Kinship Matters: The Ethical Field of Kidney Transplant.” American Ethnologist 33(1): 81-99.
Nancy Scheper-Hughes. 2005. “The Last Commodity: Post-Human Ethics and the Global Traffic in ‘Fresh’ Organs.” Pp. 145-167. In Global Assemblages: Technology, Politics and Ethics as Anthropological Problems. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/06/opinion/06longo.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=%22christian%20longo%22&st=cse?kgw
http://www.gavelife.org/
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