China 'selling prisoners' organs'

Top British transplant surgeons have accused China of harvesting the organs of thousands of executed prisoners every year to sell for transplants.

In a statement, the British Transplantation Society condemned the practice as unacceptable and a breach of human rights.

The move comes less than a week after Chinese officials publicly denied the practice took place.

In March, China said it would ban the sale of human organs from July.

'Selection'

The British Transplantation Society says an accumulating weight of evidence suggests the organs of thousands of executed prisoners in China are being removed for transplants without consent.

Professor Stephen Wigmore, who chairs the society's ethics committee, told the BBC that the speed of matching donors and patients, sometimes as little as a week, implied prisoners were being selected before execution.

Chinese officials deny the allegations.

Just last week a Chinese health official said publicly that organs from executed prisoners were sometimes used, but only with prior permission and in a very few cases.

But widespread allegations have persisted for several years - including from international human rights groups.

Transplant tourism

Professor Wigmore said: "The weight of evidence has accumulated to a point over the last few months where it's really incontrovertible in our opinion.

"We feel that it's the right time to take a stance against this practice."

The emergence of transplant tourism has made the sale of health organs even more lucrative.

Patients increasingly come from Western countries, including the UK, as well as Japan and South Korea.

Professor Wigmore described this as quite widespread and growing. He and his colleagues, he said, had all seen cases of British patients who had considered going to China for transplants. He really hoped, he added, that people would think very hard about whether they should.

Secrecy surrounding executions in China has always made it difficult to gather facts.

The Chinese authorities recently announced steps to tighten regulations. From July, selling organs will be illegal and all donors must give written permission.

But the practice is lucrative and critics say much will depend on how well those rules are implemented. (BBC, Jill McGivering) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4921116.stm

 

China kills to harvest organs: MDs

TORONTO - Foreign patients who travel to China for transplants are likely receiving organs culled from political prisoners who are alive when their corneas, kidneys and livers are harvested, then left to die, an international group of doctors armed with a chilling Canadian report is warning.

TORONTO - Foreign patients who travel to China for transplants are likely receiving organs culled from political prisoners who are alive when their corneas, kidneys and livers are harvested, then left to die, an international group of doctors armed with a chilling Canadian report is warning.

In a new twist on an old practice of using organs from executed criminals, China has since 2000 turned to living donors and outlawed Falun Gong members to supply a growing trade in medical transplants, Doctors Against Organ Harvesting said yesterday during a public forum held at the University of Toronto.

With increasing numbers of Canadians on long waiting lists turning to China to save their own lives, the newly formed organization is seeking to warn patients that someone else's life is likely being sacrificed in the process of obtaining organs.

"Each person who travels to China for an organ causes the death of another human," said Dr. Torsten Trey, a Washington, D.C.-based physician and founding member of Doctors Against Organ Harvesting.

The group is sounding the alarm in the medical community about mounting evidence of unethical transplants in China. They want doctors to impress the information upon their patients. They want hospitals and universities to close their doors to visiting Chinese physicians and scholars looking to hone their techniques. And they want medical journals to reject research on transplants conducted in China.

"Medical science cannot build up any knowledge which is based on inhuman and unethical procedures," said Dr. Trey, who compared China's pilfering of organs from Falun Gong practitioners to Nazi medical experimentation during the Holocaust.

Doctors Against Organ Harvesting was formed in the wake of a Canadian investigation first released last year.

Authored by former Liberal MP David Kilgour and Winnipeg human rights lawyer David Matas, the report claims there is a widespread and systematic policy in China of selling organs from living donors to a growing clientele of desperate patients.

Mr. Kilgour said yesterday it is clear Falun Gong members are being targeted over other ethnic groups and religions, as a part of a campaign to vilify their spiritual practice since it fell out of favour with the government in 2000.

The report's conclusions were drawn from interviews with a handful of eyewitnesses from the medical side, recipients of organs harvested in China, official government pronouncements, statistics showing a sudden explosion in the number of transplants performed, marketing websites and undercover inquiries to hospitals.

In one instance, an Asian patient recounted that after rifling through a list of potential donors, a military doctor departed and returned to the hospital several times, bringing back a total of eight different kidneys before finally settling on a match.

In another, a sick patient found out one day he needed a transplant and had an organ within 24 hours.

Websites market transplants in China in five languages and in some cases guarantee availability of a matching organ within two weeks. The average wait time for a kidney in Canada is 32.5 months, while in British Columbia it is 52.5 months.

In surreptitious phone calls to Chinese transplant hospitals by Mandarin-speaking investigators, medical staff admitted organs came from Falun Gong prisoners.

While he is sympathetic to the plight of ailing Canadians who wait years for a transplant and face the prospect of dying before a match comes along, Mr. Kilgour said patients and doctors cannot turn a blind eye.

"Medicine cannot be practised by killing innocent people like chickens," he said.

Gerry Koffman, a Toronto general practitioner and member of Doctors Against Organ Harvesting, said there are about 100 confirmed cases of Canadian patients from Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver having transplants done in China.

One kidney specialist told him about a patient with end-stage renal failure quietly disappearing for several weeks, then returning to sheepishly seek after-care for his "second" organ. When his body rejected the first, Chinese doctors quickly supplied him with a second, Dr. Koffman said.

The exposure of China's transplant industry, he added, should also be a wake-up call to all Canadians to sign their donor cards so the sick aren't forced to make such desperate choices.

"If more organs were available, there would be no need to become an organ tourist," he said. (Ottawa Citizen, 5.18.2007) http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=20d0fa3c-f0a4-4767-ab09-25456c176c4b

 

Organ harvesting in the People's Republic of China

Organ harvesting in the People's Republic of China refers to the practice of removing human organs and tissue from the corpses of criminals executed in China and using these organs for organ transplants.

The practice was first brought to light in 1992 in a report by Chinese dissident Harry Wu's Laogai Research Foundation. It was renewed in a 2001 story in The Washington Times, in March 2006 by the Falun Gong affiliated The Epoch Times, and upon release of the Falun Gong commissioned Kilgour-Matas Report in July 2006.

As of August 2009, the Chinese state admits that approximately 65% of transplanted organs come from death row prisoners. The condemned prisoners have been described as "not a proper source for organ transplants" by Vice-Health Minister Huang Jiefu.[1]

Contents

History

Harry Wu

In 1992, the Laogai Research Foundation set up by Chinese dissident Harry Wu was instrumental in proving (using court files, medical records and eyewitness testimony) that organs were harvested from executed criminals and used for transplants.[2] The Laogai Research Foundation, along with ABC, went undercover and responded to an ad for kidney transplantations in China in an American newspaper, exposing the organ trading prevalent in 1997. They have also interviewed Thai recipients of the organs and found that the recipients had been told that a series of executions were to be carried out on the day of her transplant.[3]

In 2001 a report by a doctor appeared in The Washington Times. According to his statement, he was involved in removing corneas and harvesting skin from more than 100 executed prisoners. Wang Guoqi, a "burn specialist", said in his written statement that he had also seen other doctors remove vital organs from executed prisoners. His hospital, the Tianjin Paramilitary Police General Brigade Hospital, in turn sold those organs for enormous profits. The Laogai foundation said that it had gone to "great lengths" to verify Wang's identity and that both the foundation and congressional staff members found the doctor's statements "highly credible." Wang's detailed statements, provided to The Washington Post by The Laogai Research foundation, include the dates and places of executions, the names of doctors involved in organ removals and graphic descriptions of the medical procedures.[4]

Sujiatun case

Throughout March 2006, the Falun Gong affiliated The Epoch Times (ET), published articles containing allegations by a small number of anonymous individuals claiming to be eyewitnesses to organ harvesting in Sujiatun and beyond, labelling it "Sujiatun Concentration Camp".[5] One apparent eyewitness was said to have worked in the hospital and was aware of Falun Gong practitioners being kept alive in the basement, "After their organs were cut out, some of these people were thrown directly into the crematorium to be burnt," she alleged.[6] ET cited an individual who identified himself as a veteran military doctor in Shenyang, who confirmed the claims, and said that Sujiatun was just one of up to 36 such sites across China between which practitioners were rapidly transferred by closed freight train on special routes, "handcuffed like rotisserie chickens."[7]

A Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman rejected the claims about Sujiatun as a “lie... not worth refuting,” saying that the hospital is incapable of housing 6,000 persons,[8] there is no basement for incarcerating practitioners as alleged, and that there was simply no way to cremate corpses in secret, continuously, and in large volumes.[9] Harry Wu sent investigators to Sujiatun scene three days after the story surfaced, and found no evidence for the alleged concentration camp.[10] He dismissed the claims as merely hearsay from two witnesses: "No pictures, no witnesses, no paperwork, no detailed information at all, nothing."[11][12]

In April 2006 U.S. representatives allowed to tour the facility "found no evidence that the site is being used for any function other than as a normal public hospital." The US embassy said their staff visited the site twice, the first time unannounced one week after the report surfaced, the second with official cooperation after three weeks.[13][14] The report continues that "[i]ndependent of these specific allegations, the United States remains concerned over China’s repression of Falun Gong practitioners and by reports of organ harvesting."[14]

Hong Kong-based Phoenix TV aired a programme in June 2007 and drew attention to flaws in the Sujiatun allegations, saying that the hospital was not equipped for organ transplantation; the premises and staffing were inadequate for housing thousands of prisoners; that the incinerator was only used to heat water. The hospital denied The Epoch Times-witness was their employee and doctors interviewed also denied involvement. The video pointed out that the area around the hospital was in a dense conurbation where large movements of people would be noticed. The programme also attacked the Kilgour-Matas report.[15]

Kilgour, and Ethan Gutmann, adjunct fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies implied a cover up, stating that the three weeks between when the story broke to when the US State Department officials conducted their investigation is long by Chinese construction standards.[16][17] Gutmann questioned the exact circumstances of the visit of State Department officers, whether they toured an unaltered facility unaccompanied by minders, whether they took samples, and whether they had unfettered access to interview any hospital personnel.[16] Kilgour and Matas later accused Wu of bad faith for drawing his conclusions without interviewing the witnesses.[18] Wu, who was on cordial terms with the Falun Gong until he challenged its claims, said he was refused permission by Falun Gong officials to interview the witnesses.[5]

Kilgour-Matas report

On July 20, 2006, former Canadian MP David Kilgour and Human Rights Lawyer David Matas presented the findings of their two month investigation, conducted in response to a request by the Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong.[19]

Some of the calls were placed on behalf of the Falun Gong practitioners by people posing as either potential recipients or as their relatives, who called in to a number of hospitals inquiring about organ availability.[20] The authors admitted difficulty in verifying the allegations, due to the lack of independent bodies which investigate conditions in China, availability of eyewitness evidence and official information about organ transplantation. They claim that they were also denied visas to China.[21] The report presents 33 strands of evidence which the authors say lead to the positive conclusion.[12] While taken individually, the pieces of evidence do not prove the allegations, the authors say their combination was the deciding factor, allowing them to conclude that the allegations of China's harvesting of organs from live Falun Gong practitioners were true. They alleged that the practice was still ongoing, and called for a ban on Canadian citizens traveling to China for transplant operations.[22][23] In 2007, they presented an updated report saying that the harvesting of organs from unwilling Falun Gong practitioners was still continuing "on a large scale".[24]

Evidence

Of 60,000 organ transplants officially recorded between 2000 and 2005, 18,500 came from identifiable sources; the source of 41,500 transplant organs could not thus be explained. In 2007, Kilgour and Matas said that traditional sources of transplants such as executed prisoners, donors, and the brain dead "come nowhere near to explaining the total number of transplants across China." They said that "the only other identified source which can explain the skyrocketing transplant numbers is Falun Gong practitioners."[25] K&M say that since China has no organized donation system, and a cultural aversion to organ donation, the availability of voluntarily donated organs for transplants is scarce; hospitals are known to profit from illegally selling the organs of death-row prisoners. The authors allege that this policy might be easily transferred to Falun Gong practitioners because healthcare and army facilities in China are self-reliant for funding.[25]

Kilgour and Matas assert that information found on several Chinese hospital websites is "self-accusatory".[25] The report stated that organ transplanting is a highly profitable industry in China, and it provided a list of prices in US dollars found on Chinese transplant websites in April, 2006. These range from US$62,000 for a kidney, to US$130,000-160,000 for a heart.[26] Many show graphs with soaring organ transplantation figures—these start going up after 1999, when the persecution of Falun Gong began. In addition, many such websites state that the organs can be found "immediately". According to the Epoch Times, the CIOT website advertises the waiting time for a kidney transplant as being "as short as a week and no longer than a month".[27]

Other reports or reactions

A Congressional Research Service report by Dr. Thomas Lum stated that the Kilgour-Matas report relied largely on logical inference, without bringing forth new or independently-obtained testimony; the conclusions also rely heavily upon transcripts of telephone calls with reported PRC respondents, the credibility of which is questionable due to the Chinese government's controls over sensitive information.[13]

Associate Director of the Program in Human Rights and Medicine in the University of Minnesota, Kirk C. Allison, (2006) and Tom Treasure of Guy's Hospital, London (2007), considered the report plausible from a medical standpoint. They point out the numerical gap in the number of transplants and the short waiting times in China compared with other countries.[28][29] Allison asserted that the "short time frame of an on-demand system [as in China] requires a large pool of donors pre-typed for blood group and HLA matching," and cites consistency with the K&M report allegations about the systematic tissue typing of Falun Gong prisoners. Allison called for academia and medical circles to stop cooperating with China on organ transplantation.[30]

In May 2008 two United Nations Special Rapporteurs reiterated their previous request for the Chinese authorities to adequately respond to the allegations.[31] They also asked the authorities to explain the source of organs for the sudden increase in organ transplants in China since 2000. The request was a follow-up to a previous communication on August 11, 2006, made with Sigma Huda, UN Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons. In 2006, Chinese authorities responded with categorical denials, and "failed to address the critical issues raised by the Special Rapporteurs", according to the Falun Gong Human Rights Working Group.[31] In November 2008, the United Nations Committee Against Torture, citing the UN special Rapporteur's note that the increase in organ transplant operations coincides with “the beginning of the persecution of [Falun Gong practitioners]”, noted its concern at the allegations and called for China to "immediately conduct or commission an independent investigation of the claims", and take measures "to ensure that those responsible for such abuses are prosecuted and punished".[32]

David Ownby, a noted expert on Falun Gong, said "Organ harvesting is happening in China, but I see no evidence proving it is aimed particularly at Falun Gong practitioners."[33] Glen McGregor of the Ottawa Citizen said "Depending on who you believe, the Kilgour-Matas report is either compelling evidence that proves the claims about Falun Gong... or a collection of conjecture and inductive reasoning that fails to support its own conclusions". He said he was one of the few journalists who had not treated the report as fact, and that he had for this reason been compared to holocaust deniers by Matas and Kilgour. McGregor said that the allegation is "a substantial escalation that none of these groups [Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the UN's Special Rapporteur on torture] have confirmed".[12]

Amnesty International has stated that it is "continuing to analyze sources of information about the Falun Gong organ harvesting allegations, including the report published by Canadians David Matas and David Kilgour." The organisation points out that there is "a widely documented practice of the buying and selling of organs of death penalty prisoners in China." Their report continues to say that while "it is unknown how many Falun Gong practitioners are being executed by the Chinese authorities ... various sources indicate China may be executing between 10,000-15,000 people a year."[34]

Response of Chinese authorities

China has repeatedly denied the organ harvesting allegations in the report.[35][36] The Chinese Embassy in Canada replied to the first version of the Kilgour-Matas report immediately upon its release on July 6, stating that China abided by World Health Organization principles that prohibit the sale of human organs without written consent from donors. The authors were accused of wanting to smear China's image. "[T]he so-called 'independent investigation report' made by a few Canadians based on rumors and false allegations is groundless and biased." The Chinese Embassy in Washington also said the allegations were "totally fake" and said the Chinese government had already investigated the claims and found them meritless.[37]

Legal framework

Involuntary organ donation is illegal under Chinese law, but critics say Beijing does not enforce the policy.[citation needed]

Under a 1984 draft regulation, it became legal to harvest organs from convicted criminals; such operations can take place only with the consent of the family or if the body goes unclaimed.[38] Official execution figures are classified.

According to a 2006 Congressional Executive Commission report, Huang Jiefu, China's Vice Minister of Health, had indicated in July 2005 that as many as 95% of all organ transplants in China derive from executions [39] and that approximately 65% of "capital offenses" in China are for nonviolent crimes.[40]

Response

International

Before the advent of the lethal injection (which did not damage internal organs) in the late 1990s, China administered executions with a single bullet to the head or the heart to preserve the organs. Human rights organizations have questioned the way in which organs are obtained.[38] The World Medical Association made declarations condemning these practices[specify] on various grounds in 1985, 1987, and 1994. In June 2006, Edward McMillan-Scott, vice president of the European Parliament, said he believed that nearly 400 hospitals in China shared the lucrative trade in transplant organs, with websites advertising new kidneys for $60,000.[41]

On August 14, 2006, a statement from the US National Kidney Foundation (NKF), referring to the Kilgour Matas Report, stated that the foundation was "deeply concerned about recent allegations regarding the procurement of organs and tissues through coercive or exploitative practices" and that "any act which calls the ethical practice of donation and transplantation into question should be condemned by the worldwide transplantation community." The statement from NKF also condemned organ transplant tourism in general.[42][43]

In October 2006, the Chairman of the Taiwan Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), Joseph Wu, stated that Taiwan condemned, "in the strongest possible terms", China's harvesting of human organs from executed Falun Gong practitioners.[44] In August 2007, a statement from Hou Sheng-mao, Director of Taiwan's Department of Health, urged Taiwanese Doctors to not encourage patients to get commercial organ transplants in mainland China.[45]

In December 2006, the Australian Health Ministry announced the abolition of training programs for Chinese doctors in organ transplant procedures in the Prince Charles and the Princess Alexandra Hospitals and the banning of joint research programs with China on organ transplantation.[46]

In early 2007, Israeli health insurance carriers stopped sending patients to China for transplants.[47] This was in part related to an investigation in which Israeli authorities arrested several men for tax evasion in connection with a company that mediated transplants of Chinese prisoners’ organs for Israelis. One of the men had stated in an undercover interview that the organs came from “people who oppose the regime, those sentenced to death and from prisoners of the Falun Gong sect.”[48] In May 2007 Rabbi Yosef Shalom Eliashiv prohibited Jews from deriving any benefit from Chinese organ harvesting, "even in life-threatening situations". Other Rabbis also oppose the use of Chinese organs for transplants.[49]

Domestic

In Beijing, in 1998, the Secretary and Chairman of the World Medical Association and the Korean Medical Association reached an agreement with the Chinese Medical Association that these practices were undesirable and that they would investigate them jointly, with a view to stopping them. In 2000, the Chinese reneged and withdrew their cooperation.[50] Amnesty International claims to have strong evidence that the police, courts and hospitals are complicit in the organ trade, which would be facilitated by the use of mobile execution chambers, or "death vans".[51] Amnesty speculates that this hugely profitable trade might explain China's refusal to consider abolishing the death penalty, which is used on between 1,770 and 8,000 prisoners annually. Corpses are typically cremated before relatives or independent witnesses can view them, fuelling suspicions about the fate of internal organs.[51]

In 2001, a Chinese doctor applying for political asylum revealed that he had removed organs from executed prisoners for the transplant market under the auspices of the People's Liberation Army. He claimed that he had performed operations in order to remove skin and corneas from executed criminals, and that other doctors sometimes took organs from bodies while their hearts were still beating. He also said that during at least one such operation the prisoner was still breathing.[52]

In December 2005, after many years of denial, China's Deputy Health Minister acknowledged that the practice of removing organs from executed prisoners for transplant was widespread, and he promised that steps would be taken to prevent abuse.[13][38] According to Time, a transplant brokerage in Japan which organised 30-50 operations annually sourced its organs from executed prisoners in China.[53]

On the eve of a state visit to the United States by President Hu Jintao, the 800-member British Transplantation Society added to the international pressure on China to change by criticising its use of death-row prisoners' organs in transplants, on the grounds that as it is impossible to verify that organs are indeed from prisoners who have given consent;[53] the World Medical Association once again condemned the practice. "Prisoners and others in custody were not in a position to give consent freely and that therefore their organs must not be used for transplantation".[54]

In October 2007, bowing to huge international pressure, and in response to a campaign to boycott the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games because of China's human rights abuses, the Chinese Medical Association agreed to hold a moratorium on commercial organ harvesting from condemned prisoners, but did not specify a deadline. China agreed to restrict transplantations from donors to their immediate relatives.[55][56]

According to the BBC, in August 2009 Chinese authorities admitted that approximately 65% of organ transplants come from executed death row prisoners. Vice-Health Minister Huang Jiefu said that death row prisoners were "definitely not a proper source for organ transplants".[1]

The Chinese government has launched a pilot program in 10 cities wherein funds will be made available for the families of people who voluntarily donate their organs. If successful Chinese authorities say they hope this will reduce the need for organs taken from death row prisoners and will stem the tide of blackmarket organs.[1]

See also

External links

References

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  53. ^ a b Andrea Gerlin, "China's Grim Harvest", Time magazine, April 23, 2006
  54. ^ Press release, World Medical Association demands China stops using prisoners for organ transplants, World Medical Association, May 22, 2006
  55. ^ Pact to block harvesting of inmate organs, Pg 1, South China Morning Post, October 7, 2007
  56. ^ Press release, Chinese Medical Association Reaches Agreement With World Medical Association Against Transplantation Of Prisioners's (sic) Organs, Medical News Today, Oct 7, 2007

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_harvesting_in_the_People%27s_Republic_of_China

 

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