Frank Schadt
18 Theses Against Presumed-Consent Legislation
in Organ Removal
01
Patients with the clinical state of irreversible loss of all brain function (brain death) are unquestionably alive
02
Presumed-consent legislation, in particular, rests on denying the life of the severely ill
03
The claim that brain death is the death of the human person is false
04
Defenceless severely ill patients with loss of brain function warrant heightened protection
05
The possibility of organ donation is sufficiently regulated in law in Germany
06
For some organ recipients, acceptance of their new organ depends on the donation being voluntary
07
Presumed-consent legislation is an overreaching instrument for non-consensual organ removal
08
Presumed-consent legislation is incompatible with the idea of organ donation
09
Encroaching upon the organs of fellow human beings is no answer to the illnesses of fellow human beings
10
Because organs are not a common resource, there is no entitlement to organ transplantation
11
The risk of encroachment and the compulsion to declare impair the sense of well-being of fellow citizens
12
The organ-procurement-driven imposition of presumed-consent legislation cannot be justified
13
No one has a right to encroach upon the bodies, lives, and dying of fellow human beings
14
No one has the right to compel an entire population to engage with the issue of organ donation, including to make a decision
15
Rapid, comprehensive information on organ donation and its broad thematic context is not possible
16
An absence of objection can never constitute consent
17
Every organ removal in ‘brain-dead’ severely ill patients causally ends the patient’s vital state
18
Medical interventions fundamentally require the patient’s informed consent
Nationaler Ethikrat (ed.). Die Zahl der Organspenden erhöhen – Zu einem drängenden Problem der Transplantationsmedizin in Deutschland. Berlin, 2007. https://www.ethikrat.org/fileadmin/Publikationen/Stellungnahmen/Archiv/Stellungnahme_Organmangel.pdf, 47.
Ibid., 43.
Bundesrat. Gesetzesantrag. Drucksache 278/24 B, July 5, 2024. https://www.bundesrat.de/drs.html?id=278-24(B), 2.
Nationaler Ethikrat (ed.). Die Zahl der Organspenden erhöhen – Zu einem drängenden Problem der Transplantationsmedizin in Deutschland. op. cit., p. 47.
Beckmann, Rainer. “Das unbegründete ‘Hirntod’-Konzept.” JuristenZeitung 78 (2023): 947.