Transplant experts are seeing a spike in people revoking organ donor registrations, their confidence shaken by reports that organs were nearly retrieved from a Kentucky man mistakenly declared dead.

It happened in 2021 and while details are murky surgery was avoided and the man is still alive. But donor registries in the U.S. and even across the Atlantic are being impacted after the case was publicized recently. A drop in donations could cost the lives of people awaiting a transplant.

“Organ donation is based on public trust,” said Dorrie Dils, president of the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations, or OPOs. When eroded, “it takes years to regain.”

  • @cynar
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    312 months ago

    The interesting thing is, being an organ donor potentially saved his life. If he wasn’t a donor, he could have been sent to the morgue, rather than being surrounded by doctors carefully checking him over.

  • Noxy
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    172 months ago

    sounds like a non-issue if it’s rare enough to be newsworthy and still didn’t even actually happen

    opting out of organ donation over this is insane

    • @[email protected]
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      152 months ago

      Yes, but you have to also remember that Corona beer sales went down during COVID. Says a lot about the panicky nature of a good chuck of people.

    • LostXOR
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      82 months ago

      People don’t always make decisions perfectly rationally, unfotrtunately.

  • Nougat
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    162 months ago

    Can I sign a sealed waiver that says “If you’re ready to harvest my organs and I start waking up, fuck it, bunch of morphine and keep going”?