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The article devotes just 3 sentences, in a short aside, to the idea that kidney sales could be encouraged, in an orderly and fair manner, rather than prohibited

by gojomo 12y ago

The article devotes just 3 sentences, in a short aside, to the idea that kidney sales could be encouraged, in an orderly and fair manner, rather than prohibited. (It's the prohibition which creates black market profits and kills thousands waiting for kidneys.) For more on this possibility: http://reason.com/archives/2008/05/13/kidneys-for-sale http://reason.com/archives/2008/05/13/kidneys-for-sale http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/organ-sales-moral-travails-lessons-living-kidney-vendor-program-iran http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/organ-sales... Virginia Postrel, a former editor of Reason who actually donated one of her kidneys to a friend, has also written about donor chains and compensation: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/07/with-functioning-kidneys-for-all/307587/?single_page=true http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/07/with-fun...

logicallee 12y ago
Unless health turns out to be like education and clean water - potentially better served by an other than completely private market, whether for reasons of inelasticity of demand, public utility of 99.9% literacy, etc. In that case there could be payment for organs, but for everyone else's too. Also in this case, besides communal funding, compulsory "donation" might also work. (Or compulsory "donation" but with compensation from communal funding, and a private market might conceivably ride on top of that.) edited to remove mention of "right" as it is not necessary for the analogy
- YokoZar 12y ago
  If health is a human right, how is prohibiting someone from paying to be healthier productive? Note that prohibition even includes purchase of organs from the estates of dead donors. If you want funds to come from a communal pot to reduce the problem of rich people getting more health than others that's one thing, but prohibiting the practice unless you have that sort of thing is kind of weird.
- gojomo 12y ago
  The current policy of compensation-prohibition, derived from fuzzy sloganeering like "health is a universal human right" [your pre-edit wording], is resulting in thousands of unnecessary deaths a year. And until you get 100% of what you want – perfectly equal health care for everybody? – are we just supposed to see those deaths as a price worth paying? When your ideal is finally implemented, be it next year, or maybe in a decade, or maybe a century from now, will those who died be happy to know they were noble martyrs for a good cause, a necessary demonstration of suffering to help bring the laggards around?

by gojomo 12y ago

logicallee 12y ago

Unless health turns out to be like education and clean water - potentially better served by an other than completely private market, whether for reasons of inelasticity of demand, public utility of 99.9% literacy, etc. In that case there could be payment for organs, but for everyone else's too. Also in this case, besides communal funding, compulsory "donation" might also work. (Or compulsory "donation" but with compensation from communal funding, and a private market might conceivably ride on top of that.) edited to remove mention of "right" as it is not necessary for the analogy

YokoZar 12y ago
If health is a human right, how is prohibiting someone from paying to be healthier productive? Note that prohibition even includes purchase of organs from the estates of dead donors. If you want funds to come from a communal pot to reduce the problem of rich people getting more health than others that's one thing, but prohibiting the practice unless you have that sort of thing is kind of weird.
gojomo 12y ago
The current policy of compensation-prohibition, derived from fuzzy sloganeering like "health is a universal human right" [your pre-edit wording], is resulting in thousands of unnecessary deaths a year. And until you get 100% of what you want – perfectly equal health care for everybody? – are we just supposed to see those deaths as a price worth paying? When your ideal is finally implemented, be it next year, or maybe in a decade, or maybe a century from now, will those who died be happy to know they were noble martyrs for a good cause, a necessary demonstration of suffering to help bring the laggards around?