China’s Organ Donation Program As A Cover-Up For Unethical Organ Procurement

— “This office is merely in preparation to conduct the donation work. We have not yet processed any donations.” —

Manager, Chinese Red Cross Organ Donation Office
Beijing, September 2018

The Chinese regime is touting the success of its new organ donation program, the so-called “China model.” Members of the international transplant community have hastily endorsedthe program with limited time and effort for a due diligence verification process. 

Given the restriction of information about and lack of scrutiny of China’s transplant system, some investigators have resorted to inventive methods. Between October and December 2018, researchers from the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong(WOIPFG) made phone calls to 16 top transplant surgeons from 12 transplant hospitals in China pretending to be a high official inquiring on a liver transplant for a relative in need. They asked the Chinese doctors questions like, “How fast can the transplant operation take place? Will the liver be of good quality?” Recordings and transcripts of the phone calls can be found here.

The doctors described a flourishing transplant industry with wait times of just 1 to 2 weeks for guaranteed, high-quality organs with short warm and cold ischemic times. When the investigators postulated that Falun Gong donors provided the highest quality organs for transplants, the doctors continued the conversation and did not reject nor deny this statement. 

The hospitals reported procuring organs from “Centers for Brain Death” despite the fact that China does not have a legally accepted definition of  brain death. The investigators were told that the extremely short ischemic times were possible because hospitals often carried out organ explant surgeries and organ transplant surgeries simultaneously. 

On September 6, 2018, a WOIPFG investigator called the Chinese Red Cross Organ Donation Office in Beijing asked for help in finding a liver. The manager’s candidly answered, “This office is merely in preparation to conduct the donation work. We have not yet processed any donations.” 

The internationally renowned Johns Hopkins Hospital in the United States received only12 to 20 organ donations a year. Chinese hospitals conduct hundreds to thousands of transplantation surgeries every year. When compared with the mature organ procurement procedures in other countries, it is implausible that China’s donation program would be able to provide matching organs in 1 to 2 weeks.

The only plausible source of organs, that is needed to perform this large amount of organ transplantations on demand in Chinese hospitals, is its population of non-consenting prisoners of conscience. Members of the international transplant community might wish to re-think their endorsement of the “China model”, which may be a cover-up for cold genocide.