Doctor Guilty Of Encouraging Live Organ Trade

LONDON (Reuters) - A British doctor who advised two undercover journalists how to obtain an illegal organ transplant from a live donor has been suspended for six months, Britain's General Medical Council (GMC) said Tuesday.

The GMC's professional conduct committee said in a ruling that Dr. Jarnail Singh was guilty of encouraging the trade of human organs from live donors but did not find that he actively participated in the trade himself.

The ruling comes less than two months after a London general practitioner was struck off the medical register after he told another undercover reporter that he could organize a kidney transplant in Britain or abroad for a fee. "Your behavior as described demonstrated encouragement of the trade in human organs from live donors," the council said in its ruling on Singh, who is based in Coventry in central England.

"Furthermore, your behavior was unprofessional and irresponsible."

Earlier, the professional conduct committee heard that Singh had been approached by two undercover journalists posing as a relative and a friend of a man needing a kidney transplant.

The pair said they had heard Singh had arranged for one of his patients to go to India for a similar operation.

The GMC found that Singh gave advice to the two about how to obtain a kidney transplant from a live donor and what sort of payment to that donor would be expected.

"You went on to give advice about the advantages of having the treatment in England rather than in India and about how to avoid the proper authorities discovering the truth, it was intended to bring the living donor into the UK," the GMC said.

"You indicated that you were aware of probably dozens of cases per year of people going overseas for live donor transplants."

The GMC said that Singh had not discussed the risk of such transplants with the men.

Copyright © 2002 Reuters Limited.

Copyright © 2002 Yahoo! Inc.

This article posted November 2, 2002.