Death's Waiting List by Sally Satel

903 Words2 Pages

Critique for “Death’s Waiting List” by Sally Satel After her diagnosis of chronic kidney failure in 2004, psychiatrist Sally Satel lingered in the uncertainty of transplant lists for an entire year, until she finally fell into luck, and received her long-awaited kidney. “Death’s Waiting List”, published on the 5th of May 2006, was the aftermath of Satel’s dreadful experience. The article presents a crucial argument against the current transplant list systems and offers alternative solutions that may or may not be of practicality and reason. Satel’s text handles such a topic at a time where organ availability has never been more demanded, due to the continuous deterioration of the public health. With novel epidemics surfacing everyday, endless carcinogens closing in on our everyday lives, leaving no organ uninflected, and to that, many are suffering, and many more are in desperate request for a new organ, for a renewed chance. Overall, “Death’s Waiting List” follows a slightly bias line of reasoning, with several underlying presumptions that are not necessarily well substantiated. In her article, Satel criticizes the current methods governing organ sharing in the United States, and suggests that the government should encourage organ donation, whether it was by providing financial incentives or other compensatory means to the public. Furthermore, the author briefly suggests that the European “presumed consent” system for organ donation might remedy this shortage of organs if implicated in the States. At the beginning of her argument, Satel claims that the current transplant list systems are ineffective, and are causing a shortage of organs availability, thereby allowing countless patients to suffer. At first, she makes an invali... ... middle of paper ... ... pricing organs like vultures, holding a great deal of disrespect to both the deceased as well as their families. In addition, the author fails to remain neutral when discussing the issue, and exaggerates in blaming the government, solely and entirely. Arguably, “Death’s waiting list” discusses a crucial topic of our times, regardless of how sincere Satel is in her argument, she does provide alternatives worth further analysis and consideration, after all, incentives are not that appalling to winning someone’s consent. Further research and public poles should be set up to take a deeper look into such alternative systems, yielding with insight to whether Satel’s suggestions potential in remedying this shortage of organs. While her argument might not be ideal, it does shed the light on this rising issue, and provides us with a place to start looking for solutions.

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