Become an organ donor the American way and save lives

The organ transplant program in the United States is based on the spirit of volunteerism. That is not the case in other parts of the world. This post is about China's murderous system of organ theft from live "donors."

We have an "opt in" system in the United States. If you want to be an organ donor in this country, you have to say so.  Typically, a person wanting to be a donor, says so on his/her driver's license. 

Telling next of kin, family, or significant others that you want to be a donor is acceptable.  Even those who make no election before they die can have their organs (heart, lungs, kidneys, liver, pancreas, bone marrow, skin) harvested with approval from next of kin. The U.S. system uses only volunteers, there is no coercion.

However, electing to be a donor on one's driver's license guarantees nothing.  A person has to die under "hospital conditions" and be on life support to be eligible to donate anything.  Those who die in traffic accidents, for example, do not qualify. Their organs die with them.  Live organs are required.

Most European countries have an "opt out" system of donor registration, meaning that all drivers are prospective donors. They must physically "opt out" of the system telling the driver licensing  or other authorities that they do not want to be registered donors. It is still a voluntary system.

China's "system" is a different story. Organ transplants are a growth industry sanctioned by the Chinese Communist Party.  The government sponsors the collection of organs, hearts, kidneys, livers among others from live prisoners.  There is no "voluntary," (not to mention) lawful system of organ collection for transplants.  

The "business" of organ transplantation involves the prisons,  military,  police, and doctors and surgeons and  hospitals.  They all collaborate to traffic in human organs. With its population of 2 billion or so prospective donors, China's prison system targets organs of all types. Organ trafficking is lucrative.  China has no organized system of organ donation.

Mostly the targets of forced organ donation have been adherents of Falun Gong, a spiritual movement founded by Li Hongzhi, now 63. He has since left China and lives in the United States. 

Falun Gong is based on Buddhist teachings and discipline. Practitioners combine choreographed "slow" movements and meditation with a moral philosophy based on truthfulness, tolerance, and compassion. Master Li first taught the practice publicly in 1992 in northeast China. Soon Falun Gong adherents exploded in numbers, exceeding membership in the CCP.  Adherents were persecuted by the government.

The Chinese Communist Party saw the movement as a national security threat and in1999 the CCP began a push to exterminate. Falun Gong practitioners in all of China.

Amnesty International said the CCP launched a multifaceted extermination campaign that included anti-Falun Gong propaganda, a program of enforced ideological conversion and re-education, forced labor, arrests, torture, even death to those who would not renounce the movement. Torture and death of Falun Gong practitioners became a ready source for organ trafficking.

A Wikipedia article on practitioners of Falun Gong reports that: "A...(special unit of government) called the 6-10 Office was created to lead the suppression of Falun Gong. [A]uthorities mobilized...state media, judiciary, police, army, education system, families and workplaces against the group.

"...There are reports of systematic torture, illegal imprisonment, forced labor, organ harvesting and abusive psychiatric measures with the apparent aim of forcing practitioners to recant their belief in Falun Gong."

It has been estimated that Falun Gong practitioners, numbering in the millions, have been targets of what amounts to a pogrom. Easy pickings and easy profits for dedicated organ traffickers in search of "matches." Transplants are arranged by middlemen between forced donors and those, mainly tourists, seeking a transplant. Specific dates for the transplant operation are selected in advance.

When a "match" occurs, hearts and kidneys are literally ripped out of  the targeted "forced" donors. The organs are then sold for transplants. 

Prison populations, where Fulan Gong inmates makeup a large percentage of inmates, are culled for donor matches. When a client, willing to pay tens of thousands of dollars for an organ, the search and collection process kicks into high gear. A prisoners' health data and blood type cause prison officials to select them for involuntary donations.

It has been reported that prison officials and police, who get money for organs pillaged in this way, create conditions and circumstances where the targeted "donor" is forced into physical decline.  Selected prisoners are killed over short period of time by their mistreatment, malnourishment, drug therapy that doesn't effect the organs' viability.

There is a group dedicated to ending the lucrative practice in China. Its called the International Coalition to End Organ Pillaging in China. Ethan Gutman is one of the directors of the IDEOPC.  As a journalist, he's been doing research of China's organ donation/transplant system.  In his book, The Slaughter, published last month, Gutman estimated that some 65,000 Fulan Gong practitioners were "killed" for their organs between 2000 and 2008.

The CCP considers the death of a Fulan Gong practitioner as "suicide," giving hospitals the right to harvest organs without any formal procedure.  The organ harvesters can schedule the "murder" of a donor to permit the "tourist" recipient to make travel arrangements.  The wait for an organ in China is typically one to four weeks, while in he United States, it may be years for a would be recipient's wait on a transplant list. In fact at least 18 people die each day in the U.S. waiting for a life saving organ.

I'm reading Gutman's book so there will be more to this story.