Surgeons, lawyers and ethicists from 78 countries have said “no” to transplant tourism – the practice of treating rich westerners with “donated” organs from poorer countries.
Through a global declaration, they are calling on governments to ban transplants of kidneys and other organs taken from vulnerable people – some of whom are forced by poverty into selling organs.
The (pdf format) also calls for surgeons who continue the practice to be stripped of their medical qualifications.
Signed by 152 professionals in Istanbul, Turkey, at the beginning of May, the agreement was issued on 7 July by bodies including The Transplantation Society, the International Society of Nephrology and the World Health Organization.
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Human dignity
“It’s a vision of medicine based around seeing every human as having dignity,” says Luc Noël of the WHO.
Francis Delmonico, medical affairs officer of , says that pressure from the declaration’s backers has already helped trigger bans on transplant tourism in China, Pakistan and the Philippines.
“I think there will be more pressure because of this international consensus,” says co-signatory Adrian McNeil, chief executive of the UK .
“But it will be a long haul. It would be foolish to expect things to happen overnight, because money is such a singular influence.”
