Organ Donation Is a Controversial

Organ donation is a controversial topic for several reasons. On one hand, it provides a tremendously beneficial way of helping people who are in desperate need of human organs that are in very short supply. On the other hand, there are obvious issues of sensitivity with respect to grieving family members since every donor organ necessarily comes from a deceased person, most of whom have loved ones. The other principal objection to organ donation is the fear that designation as an organ donor increases the risk that emergency medical technicians and other first responders might give up and suspend life-saving treatments at the scenes of traumatic accidents prematurely and treat accident victims as potential organ donors rather than patients in order to permit hospital organ harvesting teams to begin harvesting organs for donation. On balance, both of those considerations raise valid concerns but each of them is fully capable of effective resolution without objecting to organ donation in principle. Provided those concerns can be negotiated effectively and appropriately, organ donation is a very valuable medical procedure that can save human lives without any negative consequences.

Argument

Every year, thousands of patients die in the United States because their own organs, such as their hearts, lungs, and kidneys are damaged or diseased and incapable of supporting life. Since the 1960s, medical science has perfected the technique of organ transplantation in conjunction with conquering the barrier formerly posed by the problem of tissue rejection in the recipient. Today, surgeons routinely transplant donor organs without significant risks to the recipients, particularly in relation to the consequences of the alternative, since virtually all organ-donation situations involve life-or-death circumstances for recipients. For this reason, many states encourage drivers to check the Organ Donor box on their drivers licenses so that their organs can be harvested to save the lives of others in the unfortunate circumstances of a fatal accident.

In principle, organ donation is very obviously beneficial to society because donor organs necessarily come from deceased individuals whose organs would otherwise go to waste. Meanwhile, every single organ successfully transplanted offers the very real chance of a renewed and significantly extended life for patients suffering from debilitating and life-shortening diseases. In that respect, every healthy potential organ donor who dies without donating his or her organs represents another human life that will likely end prematurely. Even with full participation in organ donation programs, there are still insufficient numbers of organs available to meet the needs of all of the patients on all of the existing waiting lists for organs. In fact, thousands of patients who are already on waiting lists die every year because suitable donor organs do not become available for them in time to spare their lives.

One of the most common objections to organ donation is that it is insensitive to approach grieving parents and other relatives who are suffering in the immediate aftermath of the traumatic loss of their children or other loved ones with a request for the organs of their family members. That is especially true because in the vast majority of cases, prospective organ donors are younger than their surviving family members since only organs from relatively young people are suitable for use as transplant organs. However, those family members who do provide consent to harvest their loved one's organs invariably come to regard that choice as something that gives meaning to the untimely deaths of their loved ones. In many cases, the gratitude expressed by the recipients and their families helps the grieving families overcome their own tragedy of loss. Ultimately, proper training and sensitivity of the medical personnel responsible for approaching grieving family members can mitigate the potential harm to those families associated with the request.

The other principal objection to organ donation is the fear that life-saving procedures might be terminated prematurely on accident victims whose drivers licenses designate them as organ donors. Naturally, to the extent that possibility actually materializes, that is a very valid concern. In fact, it is a risk, albeit a relatively small one, because medical errors do occur in every aspect of medicine including the assessment of grievously injured accident victims. From the perspective of self preservation and self-interest, the fear of being designated an organ donor instead of a patient is a very legitimate concern. However, it is likely that proper training of emergency medical technicians and other first responders can all but eliminate this risk to the victims of accidents who consent to be organ donors. Furthermore, that particular issue does not apply at all to situations where the prospective donor is identified as being clinically dead by experienced physicians in hospitals instead of by less trained medical personnel on the roadside scene of accidents.