You're lying down on a hospital bed in excruciating pain. You've been there for a week and you're just receiving your third dialysis. Instead of a kidney filtering your body waste it's replaced by a machine. It's possible to live for years with this treatment, twenty years if you're lucky. The doctor puts you on the waitlist for a kidney transplant due to a shortage of organ donors. You then are left with a question. Who would give up an organ for free? Many Americans are in need for organ transplants, but only a few are able to survive since there aren't enough donated organs. Like many other countries, it is illegal to purchase an organ in the United States. Many turn to foreign black markets, such as China as their only chance of receiving an organ. There has been a rise in organ sale activity in the black market, which is not always the safe choice. The black market isn't regulated, safe, donors are often scammed, and there's a chance that some organs could have been forcefully taken. With annual rises of patients in need of a kidney and black market activity, can paying donors solve these issues?.
Throughout the years more and more kidney failures patients are rising, while many are turning to black markets as a chance for help. According to the U.S Health and Human Service department, from January 2014 to the end of November there has been about 19,400 transplant performed, but 124,000 were on the waitlist this year. Due to shortage of organ donor, now only 79,000 patients are currently active to receive a transplant. This years donors only reached 9,500. From 2003 to 2013, the need of a kidney transplant has raised by 40,000. Today more kidney failures are rising and many people have to wait nine years to receive a transplant (Tao) In the U.S one person is added to growing waitlist of kidney transplant needed every ten minutes. An average of twenty-one people die each day in the U.
