Kidney scam: Noble profession, a few black sheep

Mumbai has an enviable reputation when it comes to efficient medical care, both public and private. The city has always produced iconic professionals – lawyers, accountants, doctors, etc. – and this tradition has been maintained over several decades.

But there is a flip side too — Mumbai also has a fair share of scamsters sullying various professions they are engaged in. This has become especially troubling in the medical field where those with criminal bloodthirstiness flout ethics with utter disdain.

Within this, the kidney ‘donation’ syndrome is particularly galling because it largely victimises the poor. Beset by excruciating health complications, these victims are not only given a run-around for a kidney transplant but also unscrupulously fleeced of money.

The first time I became aware of how widespread this malpractice was in the 1990s when I was editing a city eveninger. We did an exposé on how some doctors and hospitals were exploiting patients and donors without any concern for their well-being, sometimes even without their knowledge.

In several cases, those from the marginalised section of society, who volunteered to donate a kidney for money, were paid far less than what they were promised. In some cases, poor people were hoodwinked into losing one of their kidneys under the pretext of an appendix operation and were paid nothing.

In the past 20 to 55 years, despite strictures from authority and monitoring agencies being set up, the nefarious aspect of transplants thrives, albeit under the radar and done more discreetly till a story erupts when a whistleblower, activist or the family of a patient is emboldened to beseech the law.

This time around, Sir JJ and SL Raheja hospitals are in the dock with their staff demanding ₹1.5 lakh from Jamaluddin Khan, whose kidneys have failed him, to ensure his paperwork for a transplant goes through.

From a fruit seller who was earning a meagre ₹6,000 a month, this was a huge price to extract, especially since Jamal had a donor from among his relatives. But the first thing surrendered by those in this racket is compassion and sympathy.

Kidney transplants have to follow a strict protocol but unscrupulous elements misuse this very protocol to suit their shenanigans. Thankfully for Jamaluddin, he dared to inform the Anti-Corruption Bureau about his travails and the alleged culprits have been nabbed.

How does this racket survive despite strict monitoring?

Fundamentally, if the black market of organs in India is to be dented — despite various safeguards including the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Act, 2011 — it can only happen through increased awareness about organ donation.

The demand-supply equation in the country is terribly lopsided. More education on why it is not a sacrilege to donate organs would ease the pressure on demand and consequently reduce the black market.

Moreover, it is not easy for a person to register as an organ donor in India. Despite several awareness drives, information is sketchy. A friend recently went to the closest hospital to enquire and was told to go on the Internet to find out.

Doctors who work with medical ethics find that there is a private-public conflict of interest inherent in Indian law, which also affects organ donations. That needs to be urgently addressed.

But a large part of the problem has to do with corrupt clerical staff, or those in committees serving as transplant coordinators etc., as in Jamaluddin’s case. Just the fact of moving a file from point A to B — let aside the operation procedure itself — would cost money.

Patients and their families, desperate to hasten the transplant, become willing victims in this and more often end up running in circles, losing money or health, sometimes both.

But it is not just clerical and non-medical staff at fault. Without the collusion of medical practitioners and even the hospital authority at times, such a racket would not survive.

Hiranandani Hospital, it will be recalled, went through a massive shakeup in 2016, when 14 people, including five doctors, were investigated for a kidney racket. There have been several smaller hospitals that have been similarly exploitative.

Undoubtedly, such scum is only a handful, but large enough to give the noble profession a bad name. Surely, doctors know what is happening, which is why the silence of the honest majority becomes undesirable for it encourages the guilty.

The remedy, so to speak, has to come from within.

First Published: Oct 05, 2018 00:26 IST