ABSTRACT
Jonsen (1989) summarises the key ethical and moral issues raised by organ transplantation, namely: (a) it poses serious moral questions about the intrinsic morality of transplantation; (b) the determination of the death of the source of a cadaveric organ; (c) the right of persons to donate their own organs; (d) the selection of recipients for scarce organs and the procurement and allocation of organs as a scarce social resource. Of these, the procurement of organs raises further issues: there is the need for free and informed consent; when does death occur, legally and medically? Death is now based on brainstem death criteria, but used to be based on heart-lung criteria. Consequently, this shift in the test of death has implications for the supply of organs.
