The kidney sale, discounted?

 

 

“My son was two and a half years old when the doctors told us that his kidneys would eventually give up. I was set to donate one of mine to him assuming his blood group matched mine (my husband’s was A+), but the struggle began when another blood test report revealed that the earlier reports were incorrect and his blood group was O+ and not B+, as was mine.

We haven’t rested since that day. We turned to the rest of the family as rules allow donations from relatives. My 56-year old sister-in-law’s blood group matched my son’s, but she refused, and everybody advised us to go ahead and give birth to another baby. It is easy for the government to make such illogical rules and for people to give such insensitive advice. Only those who have to bear it know what it is like to go through with it.

We have been to as far as Chennai for my son’s transplant and stayed there for three months. We lost 15 lakhs in the process, without any treatment, because Dr Ravichandran was caught and the people involved fled with our money.

We were referred to Dr Amit Kumar when my son was undergoing treatment in Fortis Hospital, by a lady who was there for her husband’s treatment. The lady spoke well of him and sounded grateful every time she talked about him for saving her husband’s life. After that, we got in touch with Dr Amit Kumar and remained so for three months, either through SMSes or calls. We were warned that he would ask for a sum of 18 lakhs, but he didn’t ask us for that much. I haven’t spoken to him a lot but he did mention that there are needy donors who’d be ready to help. BRASS TACKS

The Transplantation of Human Organs Act, 1994 provides “for the regulation of removal, storage, and transplantation of human organs for therapeutic purposes and for the prevention of commercial dealings in human organs.” While it only permits medically compatible relatives to donate organs, it allows non-related and willing live donors to supply a part of themselves by “reason of affection or attachment towards the recipient or for any other special reasons,” provided that the transplantations have the approval of the Authorisation Committee, established under the Act.

I don’t think that under normal circumstances, anybody is compelled to donate their organs in their lifetime. It happens only in cases of critical exigencies. Our legal system is such that even if somebody wants to help you, he/she cannot. I have experienced everything in this one year that one possibly can when loved ones are involved. Around that time,while my son’s treatment was on in the hospital, two brokers approached us and offered to get us someone who was willing to donate. All we had to do to save our son’s life was to make him a fake relative (uncle). But we refused.

Actually, we were so obliged by the doctor following our case at Fortis that we refused to do anything without his knowledge that could unnecessarily land him into trouble.

However, we gave in later. After Amit Kumar was caught, we went to Pakistan. In Pakistan, there was a similar way one could get the transplant – a 10-day package. They charged us 12.5 lakhs for the entire transplant. That is not all we spent on saving our child. We have spent close to 48 lakhs. Nobody wants to get into illegal stuff. Everybody wants to do things the right way. We are a middle class family. Who has the money to spend on all this? It is sheer helplessness that makes you run around trying all that could save your loved ones’ life. If the government makes agreeable rules, there isn’t a way such businesses will flourish. Needy people like us in fact prefer to go to a reputed hospital which is risk-free.