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The Embryo as Organ Donor: A New Perspective in Embryonic Stem Cell Research

July 15, 2005
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Organ donation in children is a well-established practice. This practice is usually justified on the grounds of substituted judgment or the best interest standard by the parents and affords the family with some sense of legacy or meaningfulness at the time of the child’s death by benefiting society in general. The same criterion for determination of death is used for both adult and pediatric patients, namely, cessation of all brain activity or cessation of spontaneous respiration and circulation for at least two minutes (non-beating heart organ donation). In this latter criterion, patients who consent and are in a terminal health situation can be withdrawn from support and the organs harvested after death has occurred.There are presently over 400,000 live human embryos in the state of cryopreservation. Although a small percentage may be rescued from this state by embryo adoption, most will become non-viable with time and die. In this sense they are in a terminal condition in which death will rapidly occur if support (cryopreservation) is withdrawn. This is analogous to the concept of non-beating heart organ donation in older children.The purpose of this paper is to explore the ramifications of treating embryos as children in a terminal state and possibly eligible for organ donation after death. This organ donation would provide stem cells for ongoing research that promises to benefit society as a whole. Issues with this approach include the rights and responsibilities of the embryo and parents, determination of embryo death, and proper use of the donated cells. We conclude that embryos could be considered organ donors if afford proper rights and the donation process was uniformly regulated.

Keywords:
potentiality, Aristotle, embryo adoption