Scott Sisters Kidney Donation Threatens Organ Transplant Laws

[struggle4progress]

Governor's Deal Violates 50-Year-Old Donation Laws Outlawing Coercion and Rewards; What If Sisters Aren't a Match?
By SUSAN DONALDSON JAMES
Dec. 31, 2010

As jubilant supporters await the release of Gladys and Jamie Scott, who brokered a bargain with Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour to get early prison release by undergoing an organ transplant, medical ethicists are crying foul.

Ethicists say suspending a prison sentence on the condition that one sister give the other a kidney is a "quid pro quo" and threatens the ethical underpinnings of living donation laws.

On Thursday, the governor signed an order that suspended the Scott sisters' life sentences as long as Gladys, 36, who is healthy, donates her kidney to Jamie, 38, who has been on dialysis. The women have been imprisoned for the past 16 years on charges of masterminding an armed robbery.

"As soon as the governor began throwing around commutation -- getting out of her prison sentence -- he began to undercut the ethical framework," said Dr. Art Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania. "He has now put the sisters' donation in jeopardy because the parole is absolutely a payment, which is against the law. It would be considered pressure or coercion." ...

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/scott-sisters-kidney-donation-threatens-organ-transplant-laws/story?id=12515616

[xchrom]

1. recommend

[no_hypocrisy]

2. Good point.

[aquart]

3. He's an utter ass. The sister consented long before this.

She's doing it for love.

[Warpy]

6. Thank you, I thought the whole thing smelled really bad

because I can't imagine anyone involved with a transplant team doing the surgery under these conditions.

You're right, Barbour is an ass.

[alarimer]

8. He did it simply to save the state some bucks.

Now, some other entity or insurance company or Medicare has to pay for the transplant rather than the state prison system. And for him to require the donation (which she already agreed to, I realize) as a condition of the donor's release is illegal (or should be) and immoral. What if, for some reason, she was unable? Is her parole revoked? Haley Barbour is a disgusting pig, as are all Republicans.

[ThomCat]

4. WTF, just let them out of jail already!

They have been in jail for 16 years because of blatant racism. It is purely because they are black.

What other possible reason could there be for anyone to be in jail for 16 years on circumstantial evidence of maybe, possibly being accomplices to the theft of only $11! :wtf:

White people who are really known to have personally committed violent and deadly crimes that even involving weapons and drugs often spend far less time in jail than this.

You cannot claim this is a justice system when the outcome is often purely based on racism. :(

[LuvNewcastle]

5. This all could have been handled quietly,

but Haley needed the attention. They could have done this in such a way that no one found out about it until the transplant had been finished. Now every doctor in the country wants to go on television and discuss the ethics of this deal. I hope all this publicity hasn't made it impossible for this woman to get a transplant.

[GeorgeGist]

7. let no good deed go unpunished

[Crunchy Frog]

9. A life sentence for masterminding a robbery?

Isn't that a little severe? There are people who have done far worse things and gotten lesser sentences.