It is well documented that Canada has a shortage of organ donors. Demand for vital organs around the world far exceeds the supply chain of available organs. This has led to a worldwide phenomenon-a growing black market trade of illegal, unethical and often times, lethally harvested organs.
The need for vital organs around the world has created some horrific stories in the organ harvesting black market. South America is frequently associated with instances of harvesting that occurs in its mental asylums and from its cognitively disabled citizens. And China, while vehemently denying such activity takes place is repeatedly accused of being a hotbed for organ harvesting.
This past summer, David Kilgour, a long-time Canadian MP and noted Canadian human rights lawyer David Matas, released a report affirming the noted Chinese religious group Falun Gong's claims about their members being arrested and sent to prison to become lethal victims of the rampant organ harvesting trade in China. These demonstrations of extreme behavior surrounding the organ harvesting black market, globally, raise valid concerns about whether current Canadian policy adequately addresses the problem faced with the admission to Canada of living organ donors.
In Canada, a country of immigrants with an aggressive immigration policy, it is highly plausible that a suitable medical match who is willing to become a living donor to an infirmed Canadian may not be necessarily living in Canada or be a Canadian. It may arise therefore that a foreign living donor will be required to travel to Canada as a temporary resident to have the life-giving surgery. And speed of process is sometimes a matter of life and death. So it follows that Canadian immigration authorities responded with a policy modification to its temporary residents guidebook permitting foreigners to enter Canada as intending organ donors.
Under the new rules for streamlining the admission to Canada of living donors, policy makers highlight three explicit criteria for an applicant to address in order to be admitted as a temporary donor. In summary, the applicant must provide, medical support regarding the match, financial proof that the surgery will be appropriately paid for and, "Evidence that a sale of human organ is not being transacted."
This third criterion directly acknowledges the plausibility that applicants may be involved in the sale of organs in Canada. And, it suggests that immigration officers, many of whom are subcontracted, non Canadians employed at missions abroad, and who in their own right could be subjected to the pressures placed by third parties, should carefully examine related factors such as, "The circumstances under which the applicant was identified as a potential organ donor," and the "Local social context" as well as, "Whether the donor has received or expects to receive a benefit, (financial or otherwise) as a direct result of the organ donation".
But the guidelines do not make it illegal to engage in the illicit organ transplantation trade which leads to more questions about the effectiveness of Canadian immigration policy permitting the admission of foreign donors to Canada. For instance, is it possible that the donors could use their vital organs as a doorway to illegally take up residence in Canada? Or is it possible that this type of temporary residence allowance could lead to the exploitation of poor, who have no other means of coming to Canada and could be convinced by an agency to donate their organs to unknown Canadians? Or worse yet, could such conditions lead to living donors from humble situations being forcefully made to come to Canada, to serve as matches for sick Canadians?
Immigration policy is a tool which can only mirror the legislative provisions from which it emanates and as such, violating immigration policy alone is not an offence in Canada. In the absence of legislative prohibitions that effectively govern this activity, Immigration Minister Monte Solberg must now consider implementing the appropriate legal initiatives that will endorse current policy and monitor the trafficking in human organ transplantations along the same lines that currently exist in our immigration laws which expressly prohibit human smuggling and related illicit activities. To rely on mere guidelines alone, without adequate legislation, will not sufficiently deter this growing phenomenon and furthermore, will only encourage organized criminal elements to capitalize on the obvious weaknesses that persist in our current policy.
Clearly, Canada must do far more to thwart the prospects of inhibiting the black market trade of vital organs in Canada and to help protect the human rights of potential organ harvesting victims around the world. We must ensure that we do not become an open door in the illicit global market organ trade. Our current immigration policies in this area are less than reassuring.
