Should doctors assume that people are happy to donate their organs unless they make the effort to opt out?
That's the scenario being considered in the UK, as a means of reducing the widening gap between supply and demand for donated organs. At the moment, a dead person's organs cannot be taken unless they registered themselves in life as a donor.
"Around 8000 people in the UK need an organ transplant [each year], but only 3000 transplants are carried out," said UK health minister Alan Johnson on 20 September, announcing a reappraisal of "presumed consent" by the government.
The British Medical Association (BMA) welcomes the rethink. "We believe that a system of presumed consent, with safeguards, will help to increase the number of donors available," says Vivienne Nathanson, head of ethics at the BMA.
Last year, a study of 22 countries found that donation rates were 25 to 30 per ...
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