[Avodah] Rabbi: Organ donations OK without dead's consent

[hankman]

Rabbi: Organ donations OK without dead's consent
By JEREMY SHARON
06/14/2012 18:50

http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/JewishNews/Article.aspx?id=273895

In part the article reads:
“The assumption that a man is master of his own life is problematic, because in fact it is a gift from the creator and he is the one who decides how and when life ends.”

Robby Berman, founder and director of the Halachic Organ Donor Society, said that despite the positive intentions of Arusi to deal with the low number of organ donations in Israel, he would not encourage a rabbinical court to overrule a family’s wishes for dealing with a loved one.

He added that an opt-out system, whereby a presumption is made that someone is an organ donor unless they specifically state they do not want to do so, has similar problems to those of Arusi’s proposal.


CM comments:
The article mentions that the common assumption that you are the master of your life (read owner of your body) deals with this issue while you are alive. But it occurred to me as I read the article, the more relevant but not discussed issue is control of the body after death. (without getting into the issue of when and on what basis one declares death, I think it is clear to all deleka man depalig, there is no ownership (control) after death (nor ownership of your body according to the Rabbi in this article even during life). Thus you have the perfect basis in halacha (at least from the  Choshen Mishpot perspective) for an opt out system. Ie, as the dead body is ownerless, there is no reason why it should not be used to save lives where the only objection might be the unknown wishes of the person who died – IOW the lack of an opt in). But where the family or the deceased is known to object we may defer to them for various other non-Choshen Mishpot reason even though they may not actually “own” or control the body of the deceased.

Kol Tuv

Chaim Manaster
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