Buy a kidney from Manila's poor or die

[Wattle]

Buy a kidney from Manila's poor or die

Article from: Sunday Herald Sun
Clair Weaver
March 02, 2008 12:00am

AN Australian woman has paid $65,000 for the kidney of a poor Filipino father of three in a desperate effort to save her life.

The pair had never met before they were wheeled into the operating theatre of a Manila private hospital specialising in kidney transplants.

Surgeons removed a kidney from 31-year-old local labourer Alex Sarip and transplanted it into Vicki Pascual in a three-hour operation on Friday.

Mr Sarip will receive only about $16,000 for his trouble.

The rest will go to the National Kidney and Transplant Institute and its Hope Foundation that finds matches between donors and recipients.

Ms Pascual, whose health has deteriorated after three years of gruelling dialysis, told the Sunday Herald Sun the macabre transaction was the hardest moral decision of her life.

But without a new kidney she faced a slow decline until death as she waited for a transplant in Australia that might never have come.

"I am choosing life," said Ms Pascual, who works as an executive assistant at Channel 7 in Sydney.

"I will be judged because I am here in the Philippines getting a kidney, but you have to understand you can't judge me because if you were in my situation you would do exactly what I am doing."

Ms Pascual and husband Brent Jones saved to pay for the operation, flights and accommodation.

The final instalment was paid by Mr Jones as Ms Pascual lay on the operating table to ensure the procedure went ahead.

Mr Sarip had approached the Hope Foundation as a prospective donor to raise money for his family.

He had blood, kidney function and general health checks before being approved for a transplant.

Ms Pascual said she would ensure Mr Sarip continued to be looked after.

"Alex will be like extended family for me. It's a win-win situation," she said.

"This is how I see it - he is giving me life and I am giving him a new lifestyle."

After the operation, Ms Pascual and Mr Sarip were taken to different floors of the hospital to recuperate.

Ms Pascual, who turns 41 this month, described her new kidney as the "best birthday present" she had received.

"I'm excited - it's a new life, a new beginning for me," she said.

Ms Pascual said the NKTI was the country's most prestigious "mecca for kidney transplants".

Her surgeon, Dr Ronald Feller, had already operated on at least four other Australians.

There have been more than 2850 transplants - of which 90 per cent involved live donors - at the NKTI in the past two decades.

Many of the donors, including Mr Sarip, were poor Filipinos from shanty towns and villages.

At the Hope Foundation office, which the Sunday Herald Sun visited during the week, more than 100 people were waiting to register as donors.

Each person took a numbered ticket and waited until they were called.

There are 1370 people on the kidney waiting list in Australia, facing an average wait of between four and 10 years if they survive.

None of them knows where he or she ranks - nor the likelihood of receiving an organ.

"The shortage of kidneys is so bad in Australia. It's not good enough," Ms Pascual said.

"It's hell. For three years of my life I have felt like I am dying."

She hoped that by sharing her experience, she would encourage more Australians to register as donors.

She will need to keep taking immuno-suppressant drugs indefinitely to prevent her body rejecting the kidney.

But having the new organ will change her life. She will no longer need to stick intravenous lines into her arm three times a week to clean her blood on a dialysis machine.

And the couple - who were planning to try for a baby when she first fell ill - may have a second chance if the kidney continues to perform well after two years.

As well as hospital-run donorship schemes, there is a thriving black market.

In the poor village of Kasiglahan, 20km north of Manila, locals said at least 200 men had sold their kidneys.

A local broker convinced them to sell their kidneys for about $2800 each.

Rickshaw driver Alfredo Delacruz, a 40-year-old father of two, has a 30cm scar after selling a kidney to get money for food four years ago.

He has had no medical check-ups and his family still lives in a tiny shack.

"Life is the same," he said. "The money ran out in one year."

To register as an organ donor, request a form at any Medicare office, go to www.medicareaustralia.gov.au or call 1800 777 203 (free call).

Vicki's journey will be shown on Channel 7's Today Tonight this week.


A nervous Alex Sarip in hospital awaits the removal of a kidney. Picture: Michael Perini