San Francisco, CA – A federal appeals court says some bone marrow donors can be paid, overturning a decades-old law that made such compensation a crime.
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In its ruling Thursday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said a recent technological breakthrough in donating bone marrow is akin to blood-plasma donation. Therefore, the court ruled, it should be exempt from a law making it a felony to sell human organs for transplants.
The court did say it remains a felony to compensate donors for undergoing the older donation method, which extracts the marrow from the donors’ bones.
The ruling overturns a lower court decision barring compensation for all bone marrow donations.
MoreMarrowDonors.org brought the case, seeking to offer donors $3,000 in the form of a scholarship, housing allowance or gift to charity.
They pay for blood, so why not.
I am curious, what is this “recent technological breakthrough”?
I donated bone marrow the old way back in 2004 and it fealt great. It was done in the OR while I was up but fully sedated (I had the option of being fully asleep but I did not want) and under regional anesthesia (spinal epidural). I was under some pain the next few days but the feeling was wonderful and compensated for all that.
I would never consider asking money for that. I would love the opportunity to do it again althogh I hope such a donation is never needed by anyone.
There’s a wonderful organization giftoflife.org which assisted at every step of the way. I was very moved when they forwarded me a letter (was all anonymously) from the recipients family expressing their gratitude.