Award winner Christin Hempeler from the Institute for Medical Ethics and History of Medicine at Ruhr University Bochum
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Is it ethically acceptable to allow people to sell their kidneys? Medical ethicist Christin Hempeler has explored this question. For her work, she received the Young Scholar Award from the Academy of Medical Ethics.
It is well known that in many countries, there are far fewer organs available for transplantation than are actually needed. To address this shortage—at least for certain organs—some researchers propose establishing a government-regulated market where people can voluntarily sell their kidneys. Christin Hempeler of Ruhr University Bochum has investigated the extent to which selling a kidney would truly be a voluntary choice for people living in poverty. The medical ethicist received the Young Researchers’ Award from the Academy for Ethics in Medicine for her work. Hempeler accepted the award, which comes with a prize of 2,500 euros, on September 26, 2024, in Tübingen.
Arguments for and against kidney markets
The introduction of kidney markets is a subject of heated debate. “Critics “Within such a market, critics argue, among other things, that the offer of a large sum of money in exchange for a kidney would be so irresistible to people living in poverty that they would have virtually no choice but to accept it. This would limit the voluntary nature of their consent,” says Christin Hempeler. “Proponents In contrast, proponents argue that offers cannot exert coercion, even if their aim is to motivate individuals to act in a certain way.” This perspective corresponds to a standard theory of coercion in medical ethics, the so-called baseline theory of coercion. It holds that offers cannot exert coercion because they merely open up a new option for action without restricting previous options.
Offers can exert pressure
Christin Hempeler disagrees with this view. In her work, she demonstrates that the reasoning behind baseline theory does not hold up in the case of kidney markets. “It fails to take into account that introducing the option to sell a kidney for a large sum of money on the market would cause structural social changes,” explains the researcher, adding: “People living in poverty could face social pressure to sell their kidneys. Or government efforts to combat poverty could be reduced because people are expected to sell their kidneys first.” Therefore, kidney markets would not merely add a new option for people living in poverty without restricting their existing options. “They would alter the entire context in which people live and act,” concludes the medical ethicist.
Standard theories of compulsion are not suitable in certain contexts
In her work, Christin Hempeler demonstrates that baseline theory, as the standard theory of coercion, is not suitable for assessing whether the offer to sell a kidney would exert coercion on people. In doing so, the researcher highlights a fundamental limitation of the theory: namely, that it does not account for potential structural changes brought about by offers and is therefore unsuitable in some contexts for assessing the voluntariness of informed consent.
Contact:
Christin Hempeler
Institute for Medical Ethics and History of Medicine
Ruhr University Bochum
Phone: +49 234 32 28582
Email: christin.hempeler@ruhr-uni-bochum.de
Institute website