Age Discrimination and Kidney Transplants. Over 50? Forget It!

Are you waiting for a kidney transplant? If the UNOS (United Network for Organ Sharing ) has their way, your age may dictate whether your name stays on the transplant list or gets dropped. FOX News and the Washington Post are reporting that the healthier, younger patients will be getting the good kidneys for transplant first. If this passes, my friend Vicki who has been on a list for several years and is now over 50 will be hard pressed to get a donor kidney. Is it fair?

Some bioethicists and transplant surgeons say yes. Others worry that people will stop donating the kidneys. If people who need kidneys age 50 and over are going to be dropped, will they still want healthy kidneys donated from 50 year olds? Others like Lainie Friedman Ross, a University of Chicago bioethicist and physician, say that people age 50 and older will never see the good kidneys from donors aged 35 and under if this goes into effect. Ross says that people in their 50s and 60s can live another 20 years with a good donor kidney.

Can the UNOS make age discrimination an acceptable part of their program? Is it fair or legal to hold kidneys back from people who have been on the list and are over 50? Did Obamacare start us down this path? If so, should people over 50 just forget most medical procedures and opt to sit in the corner until they meet the Lord? Either age discrimination exists or it is not tolerated and is illegal. Right or wrong?

There has always been a shortage of donor kidneys. Its said that approx. 4,500 people die each year waiting on one. It seems that the UNOS has decided that number will be made up of people 50 years of age and over.

Is this the first hint at the "death panels" so many feared would be a part of Obamacare? Will a 20 year old who has kidney disease AND heart problems be knocked lower on the list than a 25 year old that only needs the kidney transplant? Will they look at the 25 year old and say they can earn more and pay the government more than the 20 year old?

When will the UNOS go from age discrimination to deciding that only the wealthy or only the "important" people need to get transplants? There was a reason we were taught about Pandora's box when we were young. This is another case of opening Pandora's box and not knowing where its going to end.

sources:
FOX NEWS
Washington Post