A Nigerian doctor has dismissed claims that young men who visited an Abuja hospital months ago to donate their kidneys were coerced into the procedure, insisting that the donors acted voluntarily and understood what they were consenting to.
Dr Torngee Malu, in an interview with Channels Television monitored by The News Chronicle, said the accounts given by the donors themselves showed that they were fully aware that their kidneys would be donated to patients battling end-stage kidney disease.
According to him, the donors stated that they were taken to court to swear affidavits before the kidney donation procedures were carried out.
Malu therefore argued that the case should be treated as one of kidney donation rather than kidney harvesting and trafficking, as has been widely alleged.
He maintained that the doctors involved followed standard procedures, noting that kidney donors must be adults, must give informed consent and must undergo the procedure in a properly equipped hospital.
On the money reportedly given to the donors after the procedure, Malu drew a comparison with blood donation, arguing that people routinely receive payment for donating blood, which he described as an organ.
He consequently called for the doctors involved to be commended rather than victimised, insisting that the circumstances surrounding the kidney donations should be properly understood before conclusions are reached.
