The Undead: Organ Harvesting, the Ice-Water Test, Beating Heart Cadavers - How Medicine Is Blurring the Line Between Life and Death
by Dick Teresi
The Undead is Unreadable (3/15/2012)
The author completely mischaracterizes the universally approved process of declaring someone dead through neurological criteria.
This criteria is widely accepted by physicians and neuroscientists – and is based on more than 25 years of medical and scientific study.
The article, meanwhile, misuses the term life-support. Before an organ transplant, the patient is dead but machines profuse the organs to keep them viable. This is not life support.
By distorting the facts, he attempts to instill fear among generous Americans inclined to register as organ donors. Meanwhile, 112,000 men, women and children sit on the transplant list. Each day, 18 of them will die.
The inaccurate article also could deny the families of donors the opportunity to find solace by knowing their loved ones were able to save the lives of others. Every day at the NJ Sharing Network, we see the benefit donation makes not just to those who receive organs but to the donor families as well.
The author states that he will not sign a donor card. Perhaps he should make his wishes known that he also will decline ever accepting an organ if one is needed to save his own life.