Pay off student loans with a kidney?

Students could pay off debts by donating kidneys, says academic
Kidney donors should be paid £28,000 for their organs, according to an academic who claims the move could help students pay off their university debts.

By Martin Beckford, Health Correspondent

11:31PM BST 02 Aug 2011

Sue Rabbitt Roff said that paying live donors would encourage more to come forward and so shorten waiting lists, as three people currently die every day because they were unable to receive a transplant.

She claimed that it would not be “such a big step” from current systems, whereby medical research subjects are paid wages and workers who lose organs receive compensation, and would avoid the black market that exists in other countries.

Dr Rabbitt Roff, a research fellow in medical sociology at Dundee University, wrote in an comment piece published online at BMJ.com: “It’s time to begin to explore how to pilot paid provision of live kidneys in the UK under strict rules of access and equity.

“We need to extend our thinking beyond opt-in and opt-out to looking at how we can make it possible for those who wish to do so to express their autonomy in the same way as current donors are encouraged to do by making available a healthy kidney for a fee that is not exploitative.”

However her call has not been backed by leading kidney charities.

Professor Neil Turner, Chairman of Kidney Research UK, said: “The decision to become a living organ donor is one which is extremely personal and should not be motivated, influenced or incentivised by the prospect of financial gain.

“Such a system would likely be open to abuse and we have yet to fully explore other alternatives - such as an opt-out approach to the organ donor register, which we would favour instead.

“The idea that you can sell one of your organs to pay off a substantial debt, such as a student loan, will undoubtedly appeal to some people. However, if money is their only motivation, they may well find that they come to regret their decision at a later date.”

Tim Statham, chief executive of the National Kidney Foundation, added: “I think payment could actually be harmful because at the moment people do this altruistically.

“If they thought they might be perceived as doing it for payment, it could actually reduce the number of donors.”

Currently less than one in three of the population is on the NHS’s organ donation register, and earlier this week the DVLA started asking all motorists who apply for driving licence if they want to sign up in order to boost numbers.

Previous attempts to set up a system of “presumed consent”, whereby individuals have to opt out of leaving their bodies to medicine, have been rejected.

Patients who suffer kidney failure face years on waiting lists as the supply of deceased donor organs has not increased but demand has risen.

About one in 10 transplanted kidneys now come from live donors, usually relatives or spouses of the patient, who give up one of their two organs.

But Dr Rabbitt Roff said more kidneys are needed, particularly as diabetes rates increase, and that regulating the market and introducing large payments would increase donations while preventing poor people being exploited.

“If the standard payment were equivalent to the average annual income in the UK, currently about £28,000, it would be an incentive across most income levels for those who wanted to do a kind deed and make enough money to, for instance, pay off university loans.”

Dr Tony Calland, Chairman of the BMA’s Medical Ethics Committee, said: “The BMA would not support payment for donating organs. We believe that one of the best ways to increase organ donation is to move to a system of presumed consent with safeguards – this would have to be supported by the public and be preceded by a high profile public awareness campaign.

“Organ donation should be altruistic and based on clinical need. Living kidney donation carries a small but significant health risk. Introducing payment could lead to donors feeling compelled to take these risks, contrary to their better judgement, because of their financial situation.”

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