Ethics of the Sale of Body Parts - Essay Example

The National Organ Transplant Act of 1984 outlaws remittances and compensations to individuals who provide body parts for transplantation. This legislation was prompted by the need to curb the sale of body parts from living individuals, as well as by the need to prevent the likelihood of people selling rights for the removal of their body parts upon death. Even though remittances to donors are prohibited, organ procurement agencies are however allowed by the act to receive payment for the removal and shipping of organs.

The revised Uniform Anatomical Gift Act of 1987, is however categorical that the sale of human organs is illegal within the United States. In section 10, the revised version states that, individuals should not intentionally for valuable reasons, sell or purchase human organs for therapy or transplantation, if the removal of such organ is meant to be carried out after the demise of the decedent. But valuable reasons in this case do not include realistic payment for disposal, removal, preservation, storage, quality control, shipping and implantation of an organ.

Prohibition of human organs trade in the U.S was necessitated by the emergence of kidney markets in the early 1980’s. Such kidneys were being obtained from living individuals in exchange for a fee, with most of those kidneys being acquired from poor members in the society (Browning, 2001). There are various sources of ethics that apply to the sale of body parts. The following section of this paper addresses five of such ethical issues, but in this case, the biomedical products are not addressed.

The sale of human organs raises various ethical arguments both in support and against such undertaking. There are two main arguments that are regularly advanced is support of organ sale. First is the rationale that an individual’s organs belong solely to them and therefore everyone is at liberty to do anything with their body organs. Second is the argument that the scarcity of organs is so severe such that extreme measures are required in the acquisition of additional organs – and that if trade in human organs would avail more body parts, then the trade is justified.

There are also various arguments that have been put forth against the sale of organs and three of those are concerned with commodification of human anatomy, exploitation of the poor and the unjustifiable pressure endured by potential donors. In regard to commodification, it is often argued that selling one’s organs is synonymous with debasing oneself and equating a human’s worth to that of ordinary commodities. Therefore whereas one has the right to use their body for one’s own benefit, they cannot permanently avail their bodies or part of their anatomy to others (Burd & Kerbeshian, 1998).

Another argument raised against the sale of human organs is that it inherently leads to the exploitation of the poor by the rich. Generally, it is the poor who sell their organ to the rich and not the other way round. Thirdly, individuals who sell parts of their bodies may be put under pressure to perish by those people who at the benefiting end of the subsequent organ harvest. Every so often, concerns have been raised that some doctors are keen to have life support