Down on the Transplantations

Doctors Admit the Obvious: You Can’t Get a Live Organ from a Dead Body

by Anita Kuhn

In a remarkably candid article about organ donation in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), a doctor and a bioethicist make the unnerving observation that, in cases involving vital organs, many “donors” may not actually be dead at the time their organs are taken from them. While this statement corroborates the view of many pro-life groups, scientists, and physicians, it is likely to be news to the general public.

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Anita Kuhn is the managing editor of Touchstone. She lives in Chicago, where she attends St. John Cantius Roman Catholic Church.

more on medicine from the online archives

33.3—May/June 2020

Healing Medicine

on the Wisdom of the Good Doctor Edmund Pellegrino by Allen H. Roberts II

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