Harvested alive: Trump must step in before doctors farm us for spare parts

The action against the OPO serving Kentucky and parts of three neighboring states comes after horrific incidents involving patients’ organs being removed for donation while their bodies still showed signs of life. A federal investigation found that, of 351 cases between 2021 and 2024 where organ donation was authorized, but not completed by the Kentucky OPO, nearly one-third (103 cases) “had concerning features, including 73 patients (20.8%) on whom either the initial or subsequent neurological findings should have prompted earlier consideration of terminating” organ recovery. The New York Times reported on a separate incident where Alabama surgeons opened up a patient’s chest to begin organ recovery, only to discover her heart was still beating.

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Where OPOs are cutting corners with dangerous and deadly consequences, HHS should move to revoke their certification, as a new law reforming the organ transplant system allows. But the Trump administration should also go further and seek to prevent a similar trend before it starts: a macabre proposal recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine to allow “death via organ donation.”

In a related interview, one of the journal’s authors explained the process: A patient “would receive an anesthetic, just like you would for any other surgical procedure, and under anesthesia, the organs would be removed. So they’d be removed while they’re still functioning.” In other words, the patient’s organs would be harvested while they’re still alive — with doctors causing the death via the harvesting.

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We’ve already seen how some OPOs have engaged in unethical and unprofessional conduct to obtain organs from patients. Introducing assisted suicide as another option for OPOs to procure organs would raise even more questions — and likely harm more patients, particularly those with disabilities. That’s why the Trump administration and Congress should act to prevent any OPO from transplanting organs obtained via assisted suicide.

As the mother of a daughter with cystic fibrosis, I support organ donation and want to ensure Americans feel comfortable that their wishes will be respected. Decertifying OPOs who have engaged in the abuses that marked the Kentucky organization is a good first step in re-establishing patient trust. Preventing any potential link between assisted suicide and organ transplantation would continue this important process.

(*) Full article: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/op-eds/4693335/trump-ban-death-organ-donation-opo-reform/