Organs for sale: Japanese tourists received illegal kidney and liver transplants in China

The Chinese government has began an investigation into the activities of a hospital after the Japanese press broke a story about 17 Japanese who traveled there and paid large sums of money for organ transplants:

“China strongly opposes organ transplant tourism,” the Ministry of Health said Tuesday in a statement on its Web site, adding that the hospitals and medical personnel “who carried out the organ transplants against the rules will be severely dealt with according to the law.”

China has banned all transplants for foreigners – so-called “organ tourists” – because an estimated 1.5 million Chinese are on waiting lists for transplants. The ban was issued May 1, 2007.

The ministry’s investigation, reported in the state-run newspaper China Daily, comes after a report by the Kyodo News agency in Japan that the 17 tourists had spent the equivalent of $87,000 each for the operations. The price reportedly included travel, accommodation and 20 days of treatment at a hospital in Guangzhou, in southern China.

At the request of the hospital, some of the Japanese patients registered under Chinese names, the Kyodo report said. Most of the patients were between 50 and 65 years old.

The agency also said most of the organs were probably harvested from executed Chinese prisoners.

A few days ago, USA Today reported on the launch of new mobile execution chambers in China. The “death vans” are equipped with cameras and recording equipment that will apparently discourage authorities from harvesting and selling the organs of executed prisoners.

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