dc.description.abstract | In recent years the technology of organ transplantation is much matured, and organ transplantation is still the main way of maintaining of life for patients of organ failure. Asian concept of reincarnation; makes organ donation a somewhat taboo because of the traditional idea of maintaining a whole and complete body after death is still very popular. It is one of the reasons that causes a shortage of organ supply, and many patients waiting for organ transplantation suffer and die without receiving the needed organs. In this thesis, I would like to investigate the problem and call to public attention the need of organ transplantation, hoping that more people would donate their organs upon their farewell to the world.
There are ethical dilemmas facing organ donations such as voluntary versus selling, the proper ways of solicitation of organs, possible harms to the donor or the recipient, and others. There have been various ways to solve the problem of shortage of organs. Medical researchers have been trying to devise artificial organs but with limited success; animal organ transplantation has the problem of rejection by the body’s defensive mechanism; transgenic organ transplantation is in its infancy. Inter—human transplantation is still the most important solution. In this thesis, I examine the issues of brain-dead donation, fair distribution of organs by the theory of justice of John Rawls and Norman Daniels’s benchmarks, the reasonableness of related legal arrangement, and finally consider from the perspective of religion, family relation, as well as trading to find ways to improve sources of organs for transplantation.
To increase organs for transplantation by obtaining organs from brain-dead patients is one of the main methods and sources, and the result of transplantation is usually better. People are greatly praised for their altruistic donation of organs to save the lives of the needed patients. I try to evaluate the fairness of legal organ transplantation arrangement of Taiwan in comparison with other countries with John Rawls’s theory of justice and Norman Daniels’s benchmarks of fairness. However, increasing organ supply is the solution. One of the powerful ways is by appealing to religion. Many of the most revered Buddhists of Taiwan such as Master Sheng Yen, Master Hsing Yun, Master Cheng Yen have called upon their followers to support organ donation to help critically ill patients who need organ transplantations. This article also consider the pros and cons of organ trading as a proposal for sources of organ supply, but the serious harms and exploitations of the disadvantaged and vulnerable prevents us to take this step for the solution of organ shortage. However, the arrangement of paired live donations between non-related family members is a good way to shorten the waiting time for an organ, improve the sources and have better organs for transplantation. It is a system that should be widely established.
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