Matchmaker, Matchmaker make me a match.
Some of you may not have heard but there was a big roundup of conterfeiters, rabbis, politicians and organ smugglers. (see here and here) It seems one part of this bust was around a group who would find people down on their luck in Israel, give them $10,000, bring them to the US for surgery and then sell the kidney to an American for $160,000.
Under 1984 federal law, it is illegal for anyone to knowingly buy or sell organs for transplant. The practice is illegal just about everywhere else in the world, too.
But demand for kidneys far outstrips the supply, with 4,540 people dying in the U.S. last year while waiting for a kidney, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing. As a result, there is a thriving black market for kidneys around the world.
One rabbi was at the forefront while others laundered money from this operation and others through their charities.
Two things come to mind while reading about this.
1. Do we allow the open selling of organs? IE if I have a healthy organ and I want to sell it to make money, it is my body shouldn’t I be allowed? I say NO. Just as in this case, there were many “volunteers” who were coerced. I think it ends up doing more harm than good.
2. How could someone who says they are religious get involved in this? My feeling is that any group you find, there will be the righteous, the average, and the not so righteous. I don’t care if they are religious or not. To which some will say that the religious are then hypocrites. No…you can’t stereotype every religious person based on the actions of a group of them.

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