Oh, but the FUTURE IS NOW!

Because In The Year 2000,



You will be able to (only on Tuesdays) get buy one get one free on internal organs...

External organs require an additional $4.99 for S&H...

I'd be willing to donate to science, but not organ donations to other people.

I've been trying to donate it for dinner and intelligent conversation but no takers.

Guess what else that does?
It lowers your bad cholesterol..

Can I take you for a test drive first?

I would donate my organs to anyone that needs them. I have a sweet heart, beautiful eyes & a healthy body.

Millions of dollars are made on the "recovery" and sale of human organs and tissues.

I refuse to allow that to happen to the remains I leave behind.

http://leda.law.harvard.edu/leda/data/306/tissue_donation_paper_final_with_abstract.html


II. INDUSTRY GROWTH
A. The Growth

The National Organ Transplant Act makes it illegal to buy and sell organs and tissue.[14] It does, however, allow tissue agencies to charge "reasonable" fees for collecting, shipping, processing, marketing and implanting them.[15] This loophole has helped to fuel a fast-growing industry in which body parts are more likely referred to in terms of products and profits than as charitable ''gifts.''[16]

Gifts of cadaveric tissue from generous families to private and not-for-profit tissue banks have evolved into a multimillion dollar industry where one tissue donor can easily yield about $80,000 worth of tissue ''products,'' not including organs, for a commercial business.[17] One body can yield more than 130 pieces of tissue once it is extracted, sterilized, cut up, packaged and sold.[18] The processing fee for a cornea is $1,600 in Illinois. A heart valve can go for as high as $4,000. A piece of cartilage for knee surgery can range from $1,000 to $4,000 and an Achilles tendon can run from about $900 to $2,000, depending on the supplier.[19]

A decade ago tissue industry revenue totaled $20 million, but by 2003 it is estimated that revenue will rise to $1 billion annually.[20] Revenues of the nation's 10 largest non-profit tissue banks and organ banks dealing in tissue totaled $230 million in 1998, the last year for which figures are publicly available. Two years prior to that, those same organizations reported revenues of $183 million.[21]

The engine driving this market growth is biomedical innovation.[22] Tissue is being put to new uses, and processing has grown more sophisticated. Entrepreneurial firms have stepped in to develop and market new products and treatments from human tissue.[23] A handful of companies have patented techniques for turning tissues into extremely useful products, like bones that are tooled into special shapes or ground into powders and pastes.[24]

B. Entry of For-Profit Tissue Banks

An increasing number of for-profit companies are now competing with non-profits for this processing business. This stiff competition can result in use of medically questionable tissue by firms that have a financial interest in producing as much material as they can.[25] As stated by Dr. William Minogue, board chairman for the Washington Regional Transplant Consortium, ''These organizations often operate from profit motives that supersede the public interest.''[26] Indeed, for-profit entities need access to human tissue in order to generate revenue and are under shareholders' pressure to increase their market position to maximize profits. These companies are not required to take the overall donation interests of the public into account and, unlike OPOs, their boards have no requirements to represent the public interest. [27]

I am an organ donor and figured that is good enough for me.

I'm a cheap bastad.

2 things it will do.
1 Help in research
2 Save my family the cost of funeral, plot, burial insurance fees and not tie up anyones time doin' boo-hooin' they can do at home.