Problem
A. If human death is whole-brain death, what implications, if any, would that have for deciding when life begins? What if death is cardiopulmonary death? Or higher-brain death?
B. Although pediatric organs are in great shortage, given the dead donor rule, under which account of death is it morally forbidden to procure organs from anencephalic infants with spontaneous functioning of the brainstem? Why is Dr. Houston questioning the dead donor rule? Could these infants be 'donors' even when they can give no consent? What implications for organ procurement, if any, would your responses to these questions have?
C. Dr. Fraser Houston, a physician who, during his residency, encountered some cases of anencephaly ending in abortion, later attended at the birth of an anencephalic baby in a rural area. Before delivery, he called organ transplant centers to explore the possibility of 'harvesting' the infant's transplantable organs. At that time, organ transplantation was not advanced, and his efforts went nowhere. Today anencephalic donations are possible but rare. He still laments, "many organs from anencephalics go unused. One problem is the definition of dead donor.