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In Legal Gray Zone, Europeans Harvest Body Parts for US

Ukrainian company accused of gutting bodies illegally

By Drew Nelles,  Newser Staff

Posted Aug 30, 2009 6:09 PM CDT

(Newser) – A billion-dollar business of shipping body parts from Germany to the US is booming and may be illegal, Der Spiegel reports. The body harvesting is done in the Ukraine, where authorities are investigating allegations that a company has used coercion and fraud to obtain family permission to harvest bodies. The parts are then sent to a German company, Tutogen, which ships them off to Florida.

German critics concede that the practice may be legal, if parts are processed before going to America. But it is immoral, they say, because doctors often don't want the parts, preferring to use a patient's own tissue. And they say there's something wrong with gutting a person for $250,000 in skin, tendons, and bones. "Those people are truly guilty," says one woman persuaded to give up her father's body parts, "and I am outraged that these terrible things are still taking place."

Gunther von Hagens' Body Worlds & The Story of the Heart is on exhibit at the Buffalo Museum of Science in Buffalo, N.Y., Wednesday, July 8, 2009.
Gunther von Hagens' Body Worlds & The Story of the Heart is on exhibit at the Buffalo Museum of Science in Buffalo, N.Y., Wednesday, July 8, 2009.   (AP Photo/David Duprey)
Medical students watch an autopsy being performed on a man who died of gunshot wounds, at the morgue in Tijuana, Mexico, Monday, Jan. 19, 2009.
Medical students watch an autopsy being performed on a man who died of gunshot wounds, at the morgue in Tijuana, Mexico, Monday, Jan. 19, 2009.   (AP Photo/Guillermo Arias)
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When the deceased is lying in the coffin, the family members see nothing but the face. What they don't see is that the bones of the legs or arms have been removed. - Vladimir Bondarenko, former municipal medical director

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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 5 comments
justme
Aug 31, 2009 12:47 PM CDT
exactly right.
passinthru
Aug 31, 2009 11:01 AM CDT
Wow...something completely eerie about how factually correct this is to the movie "hostel". if they would have added that this is taking place in Bratislava, id be floored.
jagerhans
Aug 31, 2009 10:06 AM CDT
beasts of prey , vultures, jackals, are respectable gentlemen if put face to face with man, this vicious wild beast .

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