In China, Dead Inmates’ Organs Sold to Tourists
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
China has acknowledged for the first time the scale of “transplant tourism” — in which the organs of executed prisoners are sold to foreigners — and are to force doctors to pledge to stop the practice. The announcement is the government’s most serious response yet to allegations that hospitals are conducting a lucrative and expanding trade in selling organs to foreigners on tourist visas.
According to state-run press, the vice health minister, Huang Jiefu, told a summit for transplant doctors in Guangzhou this week: “Most of the organs from cadavers are from executed prisoners.”
This had been repeatedly denied by the government. A ministry spokesman said, “Wealthier people, including foreign patients” could jump waiting lists because they were willing to pay more.
