One of the most consistent and vociferous objections to a kidney market centers on the fear of coercion or exploitation: If you pay people to do something, particularly if you pay them a lot, then you will drive those who are most desperate and socially precarious to take steps they later will regret.
No fucking shit.
Ned Brooks, a co-founder of the Coalition to Modify NOTA, told me there are ways to mitigate “the concern that someone is going to donate a kidney because they have a gambling debt or they are losing their house to foreclosure or you name it.” His organization’s proposal, for example, would split the $50,000 payment into installments arriving only around tax season to weaken donation as a get-rich-quick scheme.
Jesus fucking Christ these people do not live in the same world I do. I did notice that the idea is mostly getting roasted in the comments, including this one, which is perfect:
Poor people would be coerced by the pay offer into doing something they wouldn’t otherwise choose to do and that could have significant negative effects on their health and life.
You are describing a job. This is what a job does.
I think that last part is referring to paying people for something. In other words, these people need a job with a living wage, not the ability to sell their organs.
“We could have people sell their organs!”
“Won’t that just coerce desperate people into doing it?”
“Probably, but we can make sure they don’t get all the money they need from it!”
…Somehow they managed to make both the problem and solution sound monstrous?
I’ve seen clips of that movie before, but I don’t remember hearing about it when it came out. It sounds like an interesting idea for a movie, but I’ve heard it’s not very good.
Live donors are an increasing source of kidney transplants. Usually live donations are directed, meaning there is a named intended recipient of a kidney donated by a relative, friend, or spouse. However, ABO blood incompatibility or a positive crossmatch prevents some of these intended transplants from being performed.
…
To increase access to kidney transplantation for some candidates, the New England region conducts UNOS approved list exchanges (LE). In an LE, a living incompatible donor (LE-D) provides a kidney to a candidate on the DD-waitlist and in return the LE-IR receives a ‘priority’ on the DD-waitlist (10). Through April 2006, 24 have been performed. Participants in the LE in New England must be candidates for a first deceased donor (DD) kidney, be unsensitized (PRA <10%) and on dialysis (1). There is a debate in the transplantation community about ethical issues concerning LE. The apparent adverse effect of LE on blood-type O recipients with no live donors is well analyzed (11). However, the full potential benefits of LE have not been investigated as thoroughly. We will demonstrate that integrating LE and KPD benefits additional candidates without any further adverse effect on O candidates on the DD-waitlist.
I wouldn’t say it’s bad. It’s perfectly watchable and has its moments. It’s totally premise over execution, but the premise (“time is literally money - a fancy meal costs a week off your remaining life, and rich people are effectively immortal while the working poor barely earn a day of extra life for a day of hard work”) makes it feel like an overly long episode of Black Mirror. And I mean that in a good way.
When the Washington Post revealed Friday afternoon that “the Biden administration in recent days quietly authorized the transfer of billions of dollars in bombs and fighter jets to Israel,” a lot of people cared. Readers of the story posted more than 10,000 comments on its webpage. A leading progressive site for breaking news, Common Dreams, quickly followed up with coverage under a headline that began with the word “obscene.” Responses on social media were swift and strong; a tweet about the Post scoop from our team at RootsAction received more than 600,000 views.
But at the New York Times — the nation’s purported newspaper of record — one day after another went by as the editors determined that the story about the massive new transfer of weaponry to Israel wasn’t worth reporting on at all. Yet it was solid. A Reuters dispatch said that two sources “confirmed” the Post’s report.
By omission, the New York Times gave a boost to a process of normalizing the slaughter in Gaza, as if shipping vast quantities of 2,000-pound bombs for use to take the lives of Palestinian civilians is unremarkable and unnewsworthy. Just another day at the genocide office.
We welcome the government’s promise of an investigation into how and why members of our World Central Kitchen family were killed. That investigation needs to start at the top, not just the bottom.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said of the Israeli killings of our team, “It happens in war.” It was a direct attack on clearly marked vehicles whose movements were known by the Israel Defense Forces.
It was also the direct result of a policy that squeezed humanitarian aid to desperate levels. Our team was en route from a delivery of almost 400 tons of aid by sea — our second shipment, funded by the United Arab Emirates, supported by Cyprus and with clearance from the Israel Defense Forces.
And [Seth] Meyers saved pointed critique for a New York Times piece titled “The Method Behind Trump Mistruths”. “Mistruths?! Why is it so hard for you guys to call him a liar,” he fumed. “I’m not sure your own spelling bee would take ‘mistruth’. You could just say Trump lied about something, and the world won’t end. You don’t have to say he ‘engaged in a quasi-deceptive part-factual utterance’. Just say lie. You can do it.”
