Webinar: Round Table Discussion: Forced Organ Harvesting from Living People

EVENT ENDED

About This Event

Sixteen years ago, the international community was made aware of forced organ harvesting from living prisoners of conscience or the intentional killing of people for their organs. This is an abuse of the medical profession, a violation of ethical standards in medicine, and a criminal practice.

As inconvenient it might be to confront and take actions to address this issue, in order to uphold the reputation of the medical profession, all medical professionals must now act against this abuse. Silence and inaction, hoping that the issue will resolve on its own is analogous to knowing there is a cancer and hoping it will dissolve on its own.

The most professional approach for the medical community is to diagnose the issue and then treat it. If a small group of medical professionals commit crimes against humanity, medical doctors everywhere need to inform themselves and act.

Our webinar will present a roundtable discussion on this topic, provide a review of the evidence that has been gathered in the past, update the audience about the latest research, and discuss the next steps of action to stop forced organ harvesting. Our purpose is to educate medical professionals and equip them with data and knowledge so as to lay a path forward towards ending the abuse of forced organ harvesting.

The panelists would be happy to answer your questions emailed to questions@dafoh.org
Questions will be accepted until the roundtable ends.

Agenda

Moderation
Roundtable Discussion
Q&A Session

Presenters

David Beyda, MD

Chair, Dept. of Bioethics and Medical Humanism, University of Arizona

David Beyda is a retired pediatric intensivist and is the Chair and Professor of Bioethics and Medical Humanism at the College of Medicine - Phoenix at the University of Arizona. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Center for Clinical Bioethics and a Visiting Scholar at the Rose Kennedy Institue of Ethics at Georgetown and is the recipient of numerous honors and awards. He has received the Humanitarian Award, from the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Arthur L. Caplan, PhD

Mitty Professor of Bioethics, Director NYU Grossman School of Medicine

Arthur Caplan is a renowned professor and researcher of medical ethics who is widely published and an expert on the topic of ethics in transplant medicine. Dr. Caplan is head of the Division of Bioethics at New York Univ. Langone Medical Center. He was former chair of the Dept. of Medical Ethics, and the Sidney D. Caplan Professor of Bioethics at the Univ of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine in Philadelphia.

Alejandro Centurion, MD

Neurologist, DAFOH, Board of Directors

Alejandro Centurión, MD, is a neurologist and member of DAFOH for more than 15 years. He has participated in various activities to raise awareness among the general public and medical profession regarding the crime of forced organ harvesting. He has given Grand Rounds presentations at several hospitals in California about this medical crime against humanity, and presented a DAFOH resolution at the general assembly of the World Medical Association in Montevideo, Uruguay 2011. He has two family members who are transplant recipients and who have received the gift of life from altruistically and ethically donated organs.

Martin Elliott, MD

Emeritus Professor of Paediatric Cardiothoracic Surgery

Martin Elliott is Emeritus Professor of Paediatric Cardiothoracic Surgery at University College London & Emeritus Professor of Physic and now, Fellow at Gresham College London. From 2010 until 2015, he was Medical Director at Great Ormond Street where he had worked as a paediatric cardiothoracic surgeon from 1984. He led the thoracic transplant team there from 2000 to 2010.
He has directed research into the pathophysiology of cardiopulmonary bypass, clinical outcomes and databases, and tracheal reconstruction in children pioneering several surgical techniques. In 2000, he formed and led the National Service for Severe Tracheal Disease in Children.
He has held several international visiting professorships and has taught and operated throughout the world. He has delivered over 450 invited lectures worldwide, including more than 40 named lectures. He was the 2015 Hunterian Orator at the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Widely published, he has edited 4 books and published almost 400 peer-reviewed papers.
He is now a non-executive director at both The Royal Marsden Hospital NHS FT, London and Children’s Health Ireland, Dublin. Other ‘portfolio’ roles include being Chief Medical Officer of Allocate Software Ltd, a member of the (advisory) Industry Council of Novartis UK and a Senior Adviser to PA Consulting Ltd. He was a member of the recently completed China Tribunal considering evidence of forced organ harvesting in Chinese detention camps (www.chinatribunal.com).

G. Weldon Gilcrease, III, MD

DAFOH Deputy Director

Dr. Gilcrease is an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Utah. He is the medical director of the Huntsman Cancer Hospital and the program director for the hematology/oncology fellowship. He has won numerous teaching awards and is a member of AOA, the medical honors society, as recognition for his tireless devotion to medical education.
Dr. Gilcrease has worked as deputy director for Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting for 5 years. He has spoken at academic centers across the country on behalf of DAFOH, contributed to legislation in efforts to stop forced organ harvesting, and continues to raise awareness about the worst medical ethics abuse in recent history.

Jacob Lavee, MD

Professor (Emeritus) of Surgery, Heart Transplantation Unit Leviev Heart Center

Prof. Jacob (Jay) Lavee founded the Heart Transplantation Unit at the Leviev Heart Center of the Sheba Medical Center in Israel in 1991 and has served as its director until 2020. He is Professor of Surgery Emeritus at the Tel Aviv University Faculty of Medicine where he received his M.D. cum laude degree. He was trained in cardiothoracic surgery at the Sheba Medical Center and in heart transplantation at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in the USA. He is currently the medical assistant in risk management to the Sheba Medical Center General Director.
Prof. Lavee is past President of the Israel Transplantation Society and past Chairman of the Israel Society of Cardiothoracic Surgery. He also served as Chairman of the Heart and Lung Transplantation committee of Israel’s National Transplant Center, as member of the Executive Committee of the Declaration of Istanbul Custodian Group, and as a member of the Ethics Committee of The Transplantation Society. He is a member of the Israeli National Council of Heart and Vascular Diseases, a member of the International advisory board of the Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH) NGO and a member of the Ethics Committee of the International Heart and Lung Transplantation Society.
Prof. Lavee spearheaded the preparations of the Israeli Organ Transplant Law in 2008, with its unique clauses which have significantly reduced outgoing transplant tourism from Israel, blocking outgoing transplant patients to China altogether, while significantly increasing local deceased and living donations by prioritizing registered organ donors.

Harold King, Moderator

Director of DAFOH France

Dr. King is Director of DAFOH France. Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting aims to provide the medical community and society with objective findings of unethical and illegal organ harvesting. Forced organ harvesting, the removal of organs from a donor without obtaining prior free and voluntary consent, is considered a crime against humanity as well as a threat to medical science in general.

Round Table Discussion: Forced Organ Harvesting from Living People - Past, Present, Future