I am - in the UK - and I think that it should be opt out rather than opt in.
It is, they changed it a while back.
I’d go so far as to say there should be no choice available to opt out
I think the vast majority of people who, even if they have some discomfort around the idea, would not care enough to opt out. The only effect of not allowing opt out, I think, would be to cause considerable distress to those who do care a lot about not donating. I don’t agree with their stance but I don’t think they should be forced to donate, especially if we can get enough organs just from making it opt out instead of opt in
Just so everyone knows, you can’t really transplant dead organs (at least not as safely or with the success of live organs).
They can only use your organs if you die in a hospital setting. They will keep pumping blood to your organs after you die to keep them “fresh” and “alive.”
Post-death organ transfer exists but is way more risky than an organ that was recently in a living, functioning body.
So if you’ve ever considered it, keep in mind that you have to die at a hospital for it to happen, and even then, they’re still technically forcing your body to be alive to keep these organs alive.
Source: Friend who lost his leg to amputation during a COVID-coma. They didn’t think he would make it. He woke up in the donor ward. EDIT: Just to be clear, this happened during peak COVID before the vaccines when bodies were just piling up everywhere. I don’t think a coma patient waking up in the donor ward is a normal thing, I think it happened because COVID was a fucked up situation and people were overwhelmed.
What does it even look like when you wake up in a donor ward? Was he a write-off and the doctors were just like ‘oh shit, he’s awake’? Do non-donors simply get disposed of instead of being brought there?
He’s older and it’s been tough to get explicit details from him, but yeah it sounds like because it was during COVID and beds for bodies were so scarce, on top of the fact that they didn’t have high hopes for him surviving (so many people his age with COVID just never made it), that they were keeping in there for simplicity’s sake. Anyway, it spurred me to begin looking into organ donation actually functions, and I mean, it makes sense, I just hadn’t really thought about it before that you technically have to have your body being kept alive to be able to donate the organs. A rotting organ probably isn’t very useful. That’s why it usually happens with terminal patients where the outcome is 100% they are gonna die. During COVID, with bodies piling up, and lack of open beds in hospitals, it at least makes sense to me that he would have ended up there, in case he didn’t wake up. It was pandemonium, at the time. Sadly, it seems to have kind of messed with his head to wake up in that situation, he’s a lot less trustful of doctors now.
If I’d walk up from coma with one leg less, I might lose my trust in doctors too…
Judging by this comment thread I’m not the only one who’s like “you can have them, but I don’t know if you’re going to want them”
There’s some of us that probably have perfectly good organs, but due to various blood born viruses we can’t donate even though we squashed the buggers with new medications.
- of course.
- i’ll be dead and won’t need them while others might. how selfish of me not to give them over
Thankfully it’s opt-out in Slovakia, so yes.
I’ll be dead. Do whatever with my body. Take the organs, fuck it, feed it to animals, compost it, use it as shooting target, turn me into soap, I won’t care. I literally won’t be able to care. Why even decline?
I would buy your soap
Fuck it?
I’ve been registered for a while now. I really don’t see a good reason not to, they only take 'em if I’m dead and what good are they to me then? Better going to someone in need.
Exactly this… Something that, at the moment of donation, literally means less than zero to you, could literally be a new lease in life for someone else
Yes I am registered, because I ride motorcycles and I won’t need my organs if I’m dead.
Throwing this post out there for a bit of visibility and discussion.
For me, I just registered 5 minutes ago. Idgaf what they use my body for, as long as someone learns something it’s a net positive at no expense to me.
Twin.
I wish I could properly state the right of first sale he has, given it’s his DNA (well, he has mine, anyway).
Fun fact: organs donated between perfect twins have no short- or long-term rejection issues. So unlike a regular donation that prolongs life for a decade or two, if he can drug me and steal my kidneys in sleazy Mexican motel, it’s a permanent fix.
Hell, when I go, maybe he’ll take a spare kidney or pancreas or something, and just, you know, hook them up. Totally fine with me.
No, I’m one of those weird people that because my family moved to the UK when I was little in the late 80s for work for a year I’m under risk of mad cow disease and none of us can donate blood or organs. Learned that the sad way when trying to give blood in college, like half a dozen random things that can disqualify you that you might not realize.
FYI, in Australia they scrapped the rule a couple years ago and you would’ve been able to donate now (at least blood, not sure about organs).
Wherever you are, maybe check again if they’ve relaxed the rule.
Unfortunately I am in United States of Freedom. Good to know though, thanks.
It looks like they lifted the ban in the USA too? If you’re still keen, do give them a ring.
Jesus, that’s awful
Up until now here in Germany we had a “system” that was a paper(!) card you put in your wallet if you were ok with donating your organs. That’s obvioisly not an ideal system and Germany has far to few donors. We now moved to an online system and being Germany it’s (as far as I’ve heard, I haven’t tried it yet - which might be a sign that this is not going to be a great solution) is super complicated and convoluted. So basically even worse than the piece of paper in your wallet (seems impossible but for Germany business as usual when it comes to anything digital).
Personally this would be one of the very few things were I would be ok with something being opt-out instead of opt-in but I don’t see that happening.
How weird that it’s so different just over the border. Here in the Netherlands it’s opt-out and afaik it was quite easy to enroll when it was still opt-in.
Apparently the paper card is still valid, there’s the online thing and you can also put it in you advance directive(? that sounds made up, I mean "Patient*innenverfügung):
https://www.organspende-info.de/organspendeausweis-ja-oder-nein/
Yes. Probably been registered for more than 10 years now. I’m in Sweden and it was a super easy online form to fill in.
When I die there’s probably someone else who needs my organs more than me.
Yes I am. As for why, my organs will save peoples lives,
I was already a donor before my sister died but it really solidified my stance when she saved three people’s lives with her kidneys and liver. They needed it more than the crematorium needed them.
Yes because why not. I doubt they will be of much use, but feel free to harvest anything you want. It would be the most useful I’ve been in my existence.
As a very strong believer in Danny DeVito’s quote, “When I’m dead, just throw me in the trash!”, if any medical party is even remotely interested in dumpster diving for my parts when I’m done with them, they can have 'em. Better than throwing them in a box and taking up land in a cemetary. The less of my remains uselessly taking up space on this planet after death, the better. If I get my way upon my demise, anything they don’t take is going into the incinerator anyway.