GREAT NEWS FOR LIBERTARIANS

If you don't have a right to decide what you do with your own body, what right do you have?

A Colorado man underwent a kidney transplant Wednesday in what is believed to be the first such operation involving an organ obtained through a for-profit Web site -- a transaction that has raised legal and ethical questions.

Presbyterian/St. Luke's Hospital spokeswoman Stephanie Lewis said the surgery was going well and the vital signs of both the donor and recipient were good. The operation, which began at about noon, was scheduled to last about four hours.

Before the operation, Bob Hickey, 58, met with Dr. Igal Kam, the surgeon whose objections initially postponed the transplant. The meeting was described as a time for "healing the scars of the last several days." Kam suddenly cancelled Monday's transplant operation after learning that Hickey had met his donor, Robert Smitty, 32, of Chattanooga, Tenn., through a Web site called MatchingDonors.com. Smitty agreed to give Hickey one of his kidneys before the two men ever met. The hospital later said the operation was only "postponed."

MatchingDonors.com, based in Canton, Mass., charges varying fees -- sometimes $290 a month -- to post profiles of people looking for live organ donors.

Hickey, of Edwards, Colo., has needed a transplant since 1999 because of a kidney disease. He said he was tired of waiting on the national donation list. Within three months of posting his profile on the Web site, he received 500 offers for donations.

The hospital's Clinical Ethics Committee met on Tuesday to evaluate concerns about the transplant, including whether either Hickey or Smitty stood to profit from the arrangement. The panel later advised the hospital to make a compassionate exception, once both men had signed statements indicating that neither would benefit financially. "We're pleased we were able to resolve this quickly with a compassionate exception. But it's also important to note that organ donations continue to be the topic of a broader national debate and more answers are needed," Mimi Roberson, chief executive of P/SL in Denver, said in a statement.

More here.




TEMPORARY SALVATION FOR BRITAIN'S DANGEROUS HOSPITALS?

Britain's public hospitals are full of MRSA -- largely because of lax hygeine

A small British firm says it is testing a compound that could help destroy the hospital superbug MRSA, a bacterium that is impervious to conventional antibiotics. Pharmaceutica, an 18-month-old firm in Worcestershire, western England, is testing a glycine compound on mice infected with methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), the British weekly New Scientist says in next Saturday's issue. The substance, which Pharmaceutica calls BTA19976A, has been tested on MRSA in lab dishes. It is thought to work by altering the composition of the cell wall, preventing a key enzyme, PBP2a, from reinforcing that structure. With its cell wall weak, the bug can be killed by normal doses of methicillin, the antibiotic to which it is usually resistant.

MRSA is a serious problem for hospitals, where it is now responsible for up to 60 percent of all infections by the S. aureus microbe, usually entering through wounds, catheters and tubing. S. aureus infections cause abscesses and boils and can lead to pneumonia or fatal blood poisoning. People who become infected with MRSA are often treated with vancomycin, one of the small number of last-resort antibiotics whose use is carefully controlled in order to prevent the emergence of new resistant strains.

Source

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL hospitals and health insurance schemes should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the very poor and minimal regulation.

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