Letter: Whose organs?

Sir: John Harris argues for legislation to ensure that all organs from dead bodies be automatically available for transplant without consent being required ("We should recycle the dead to help the living", 19 February). His justification is that the preferences of the potential recipients (the desire to live) far outweigh those of the dead (the desire to be buried or cremated whole).

However, of all the claims to ownership rights that we make, those concerning our bodies are the least contentious. Unlike our rights to property, the right to inhabit our bodies has never been sensibly questioned. His stance is not consistent with any system that permits an individual to bequeath her property on her death.

None of this is to deny that a vast number of people could be persuaded to donate their organs on their death. Social attitudes are evolving away from the superstitious/religious belief that there is "something wrong" with the use of a dead person's organs, and one hopes that in future generations the majority will choose to allow their organs to be used on their death. Choice remains, however, crucial. Each of us owns our bodies, and, since this accords us the right to do with them as we will when we are alive, we have the right to determine what happens to them on our death.

Harris refers to compulsory post-mortem examinations in an attempt to persuade us that such a right does not, in fact, exist. However, while providing good reasons why post-mortem examinations serve the public interest, Harris fails to justify his assertion that there is a "strong public interest" in organ transplants. Organ transplants are undertaken in the interests of the individual concerned; in an attempt to extend the life of the recipient because the recipient desires to live longer.

So is there a "third way"? There is, and it is one that Harris mentions at the end of his article: a "fully consensual scheme". The system at the moment is flawed insofar as it allows relatives to veto the use of the deceased's organs. Ownership rights to a body can only sensibly be ascribed to the inhabitant (not her family as well), and so her wishes should always be met where possible.

There is a strong case for a default system that would permit organ use on death except where the individual had specified otherwise.This would still allow the individual to "opt out" for any reason: religious, superstitious, misanthropic and so on.

Although it would be wonderful for all potential organ recipients to have a matching donor, they do not have the right to take possession of another person's organs.