New bill: Congress asked to allow "payment" to kidney donors

[kenny]

snip ... "The bill, with sponsors from both parties, would offer a refundable tax credit of $50,000, spread evenly over five years, to people who donate one of their kidneys to an anonymous recipient on the national kidney waitlist."

The link below has NPR's 4-minute audio report on this complex problem and the controversial proposal, including the moral and ethical issues involved.

https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2024/08/26/nx-s1-5086459/theres-a-severe-kidney-shortage-should-donors-be-compensated

 

[kenny]

Please do not react to this without listening to the audio, because the bill is not proposing what happens in the countries that harvest kidneys from the likes of prisoners and desperately poor people.

 

[pearlsngems]

I think the result would be that poorer people -- many of whom may be at greater risk of developing hypertension and diabetes later in life-- are likely to be incentivized to donate a kidney for the money. They should be the last people donating one. They may need a kidney themselves one day.

What I would like to see instead is organ donation being opt-out instead of opt-in as it is now. That is, everyone would automatically be an organ donor upon death unless they opt out. I think many people don't actually object to donating organs after they die, but for whatever reason have not checked the box to be a donor (I'm referring to one's driver's license.)

I've read that this is the case in some other countries and they do not have the shortage of donated organs that the USA has.