The NKF’s Deadly Obstructionism

Virginia Postrel points out the shameful behavior of the National Kidney Foundation in the organ debate:

When I first got interested in organ donations, I naively thought that the foundation would be in the business of doing everything possible to encourage kidney donations. I was terribly wrong. The group vehemently, and successfully, opposed a bill that would have allowed tests of incentives for organ donors. (CEO John Davis brags here, scroll to second item.)

So determined is the NKF that kidney donors should never, ever, in any way be compensated for their organs–no matter how many kidney patients current policy kills–that the organization is now trying to stamp out public discussion of the idea. When they heard that AEI is planning a conference on the subject for June 12, they wrote a letter to AEI president Chris DeMuth suggesting that the conference shouldn’t be held.

And my friend Chaim Katz points out that South Carolina governor Mark Sanford vetoed legislation that would have given the survivors of an organ donor a $1000 tax credit. Sanford cited the NKF’s opposition in his veto message.

I can’t imagine what kind of twisted logic would lead an organization ostensibly dedicated to increasing “the availability of all organs for transplantation” to oppose such a common sense measure to increase the supply of organs. I suppose that once we allow widows to claim tax write-offs for their husbands’ organs, we’ve started down the slippery slope to prisoner organ harvests and baby farming.

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