Braindead

Braindead

Thomas Allen

In “The Hidden Crisis in Organ Transplantation — Brain Death Diagnosis and Ethical Failures” (September 12, 2025), a Midwestern Doctor discusses the relationship between brain death and organ transplantation.

In 1968, the medical system introduced the concept of “brain death” so that it could harvest organs before the body died. Yet, brain death has never been proven equivalent to actual death. It merely defines an irreversible coma.

A significant amount of money is made from transplanting organs. Organ transplanting ranks at or near the top of the medical industry’s money makers. Everyone prospers— the hospitals, doctors, organ brokers (people who acquire and sell organs), and others — everyone except the person who makes the ultimate sacrifice: the organ donor, who usually receives nothing.

However, to be used, the organ and, therefore, the body must be alive before the organ is removed. With proper treatment, braindead patients can be and have been revived. Yet, if they are revived, many people will lose a substantial amount of money: hospitals, doctors,  organ brokers, and others. Getting rich by harvesting organs before the donor dies stretches one’s ethics to the limit. (People, usually in poor countries, have been urged to sell their organs while still alive and often receive insignificant payment compared to the market value of the organ, but this is primarily for organs like kidneys.) However, brain death offers an “ethical” way around the dilemma of removing organs from a patient while the body is still alive. The patient is declared braindead, and the organ is removed before the body dies. 

(Some braindead patients who came back to life noted that they were aware of what was happening to them. They could still feel and hear. This experience may explain a person’s awareness during near-death experiences.)

When a person dies, his organs rapidly lose viability. The brain death concept allows organs to be harvested ethically while the living body keeps the organs alive. Not only does declaring a person braindead allow the collection of viable organs, but it also reduces the cost of long-term healthcare — a strong incentive under socialized medicine to have patients declared braindead.

Copyright © 2026 Thomas Coley Allen.

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