EDITORIAL : The shameful trade in human misery

23 July 2015 07:24 pm Views - 6843

In our Editorial yesterday, the Daily Mirror highlighted the link between the catastrophic global warming and poverty-related issues such as youth unemployment, human trafficking or human slavery and the racket where poor people are lured to sell their vital organs.The British Daily Mirror reported this week that criminal gangs were cashing in on the poor and terminally ill by setting up deals to flog kidneys for transplants. Some penniless people were so desperate for money just to survive they were willing to sell their organs on Facebook for as little as £1,200 or about Rs. 250,000.

The British Mirror said an investigation had found a “fixer” in Sri Lanka who would organise a transplant package with a matching donor in days for £75,000.He claimed he had set up more than 100 deals and was preparing to fly out another Briton for an operation at the same price. Experts 
warned patients receiving kidneys from unregulated donors ran the risk of catching killer infections, including HIV.

Facebook urged its 1.5 billion monthly users to report such offers. A spokeswoman said: “Any indication of forced organ sale or someone offering a child’s organ for sale breaks our rules and would be removed from Facebook.”

“In countries where it is illegal to offer organs for sale we would restrict content from being viewed when we receive an official request to do so.” Buying or selling a kidney in Britain is illegal and can be punished by three years in jail.But with more than 10,000 needing organs and one Briton dying every day on the waiting list, patients were taking desperate measures.The newspaper said its investigations had revealed hundreds had travelled to countries such as Pakistan, India and China, where laws may be less strictly enforced, to pay for new organs.
They are increasingly being lured by unscrupulous “dealers” on websites who match poor donors with paying patients, for a hefty fee. But nearly half come back with serious infections and they are seven times more likely to die than those who get transplants on Britain’s National Health Service.

Within days of posting a request for a kidney for a sick relative on Facebook, we were messaged by a string of donors and fixers.One, called “Sam”, claimed he could arrange legal kidney ­transplants for £75,000 within 20 days.Confirming he was a “facilitator”, he said: “We will provide a healthy donor. The donor should be between 23 and 30 years old. “We will take care of everything. If you come Sunday night you can start the process on Monday morning. Within one week we can finish surgery. We have done more than 100 transplants up until now.”

Sam claimed he could get ­permission from the Sri Lankan Government to carry out unrelated transplants, when the donors and recipients are not family. We understand crooks get around Sri Lanka’s laws against the kidney trade by pretending to the authorities that no money has changed hands, the newspaper said. Sam added: “We need to fill out some local paperwork. We will get it, guaranteed, no doubt.” The vile trade in human organs is worth £ 1billion a year to criminals. Fiona Loud of the British Kidney Patients’ Association described it as a “trade in human misery”. She added: “It’s a shady world and it is mixed up with ­organised crime”.

Who are the politicians and authorities in the Sri Lankan Government who are colluding in this racket apparently because they are also getting huge kickbacks and commissions. The Yahapalanaya Government of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe must investigate and expose these “Horas” though former President Mahinda Rajapaksa at a Dikwella meeting tried to make a joke out of a criminal plunder of people’s resources by referring to Horas as “Hondama Rajya Palakayo.”

A Sunday newspaper revealed last week a massive kidney racket was going on mainly in Matale and Kandy districts  with poor Tamil youth being the victims. The main racketeer is identified only as ‘Kidney Salawdeen’. With the collusion of doctors he is known to lure poor youth to sell their kidneys for about Rs. 500,000. With this money the youth buy three wheelers and engage in their own business. Some of them also cooperate with ‘Kidney Salawdeen’ in bringing other youths for the sale of their kidneys and the racket is reportedly going on at a raging level. We call upon the authorities to crack down on the racketeers including some doctors who are exploiting the poor in a criminal way.