Overcoming Barriers to the Organ Donation Crisis

Organ donation is, and most likely will always be a, touchy subject for many individuals all over the world. Just by studying the statistics and the psychological reason to why we as a people do not become organ donors can back up my previous statement. There are 325.7 million people in the United States, out of those 325.7 million people, 121,678 of those are waiting for an organ transplant. According to the National Kidney Foundation in 2014, 17,107 kidney transplants took place in the US. Of these, 11,570 came from deceased donors and 5,537 came from living donors. The reason Americans do not donate is because we feel that organ donation is not a serious topic to discuss or to act on unless it deals with a relative or a close friend. Mistrust and confusion could also play a role in the decision to donate also. For example, many individuals tend to believe if they have a dying relative receiving poor treatment from doctors, it is because they want the patient pass so they can use their organs. In the article Black Market Bodies, Kristin Houser states that 4,761 Americans died waiting just on a kidney transplant and 3,668 Americans became ineligible for a transplant due to becoming too sickly in 2014. So, in one year, only 17,107 Americans received treatment and 8,429 people died or were too sick to have the operation, no reason why people in need of an organ resort to the black market. According to Black Market Bodies, black market organs account for 10 percent of organ transplants and yields 840 million to 1.7 billion dollars annually.

In plain terms, if America allowed for payments in trade of organs it would affect us both negatively and positively. The supply of kidneys is low in the fact over a hundred thousand people cannot all receive the legal operations from a few live donors and donors that are deceased, but the supply of kidneys is not technically low. There are over 325 million people in the U.S., according to organ donor.gov 42,609 organs were donated in 2017, which four out of five donations came from the deceased. To keep it more specific, 19,000 transplants were kidneys. If deregulation of the illegal sale of organs was reversed the economy would grow even more financially and more live would be saved. For example, right now there are over 80,000 people demanding for a kidney transplant, with about 144 people added to the list each day, and the supply of kidneys being about 19,000. Now, say if the U.S. was in line with Iran and allow compensation to individuals on the high end for their kidney, which is 4,500 dollars, and only 0.0025 of a percent of the American population, then, decides to donate, that would generate 814,250 kidneys and a flow of 274,000,00 million dollars circulating through our economy. Keep in mind the U.S. would only need somewhere around 60,000 kidneys, that leaves 754,250 kidneys to be sold around the globe, fortunately bringing new capital to the U.S. Although, I believe in the long run that the selling of organs will turn into I business and markets will form. Deregulation will cause lower berries to entry and competition and eventually have a negative effect on the seller of the organ instead of the buyer. Deregulation will cause the seller to lose in this situation because if markets preside then competition is present, if competition is present then prices will become lower and lower. Concurring, sellers will also begin to increase in volume in the long run and the amount of assets circulating will cause a burst in organ market and could possibly cause a crisis or recession.

Cite this page