Transplant centers happily complied with this edict; private insurance companies provide larger reimbursements than Medicare. Congress has been informed for this issue multiple times, but it saves Medicare money, so they’ve done nothing.

ACOT’s recommendations are just that – non-enforcable suggestions. Transplant centers have discretion over exactly what they include in their informed consent process and it never includes the real physiological and psychological risks of living donation (http://www.livingdonor101.com/risks.shtml).

The media perpetrates the propoganda that living donation is perfectly safe when we have NO comprehensive long-term data on donors at all. UNOS admits they lose 40% of living donors with-in six months, and the number dwindle from there. The medical community has resisted every effort to implement a living donor registry (even though one exists for recipients, so who do they prioritize?) because they fear it will reveal the truth and they’ll have to find another way to line their pockets.