The issue at hand is someone somewhere decided that 12 years old is the cutoff to receive adult transplants. The kid is 10 years old, and won’t make it to 11 years old without a transplant. I think the kid has weeks to live. There are those receiving these adult transplants that have years to live. So that’s what this whole issue is about: why are we giving organs to someone who can wait when someone who can’t is being denied those organs because of an arbitrary number? Even a reduced shot at success is better than a zero shot chance at success. That arbitrary limit should be eliminated, not bypassed in this one case. The need should be based on the individual case and severity of the patient, not the age.But the point of this toon is it brings up the risk of having an arbitrary panel managed by the government deciding who lives and who dies. It gives life to the moniker: Death Panels. While not entirely fair or accurate, it’s not a stretch of the imagination to see that fear coming to fruition.
The issue at hand is someone somewhere decided that 12 years old is the cutoff to receive adult transplants. The kid is 10 years old, and won’t make it to 11 years old without a transplant. I think the kid has weeks to live. There are those receiving these adult transplants that have years to live. So that’s what this whole issue is about: why are we giving organs to someone who can wait when someone who can’t is being denied those organs because of an arbitrary number? Even a reduced shot at success is better than a zero shot chance at success. That arbitrary limit should be eliminated, not bypassed in this one case. The need should be based on the individual case and severity of the patient, not the age.But the point of this toon is it brings up the risk of having an arbitrary panel managed by the government deciding who lives and who dies. It gives life to the moniker: Death Panels. While not entirely fair or accurate, it’s not a stretch of the imagination to see that fear coming to fruition.