The Global Body Market

Reviews / Votes

'Since the 2006 publication of her paradigm-shifting Black Markets: The Supply and Demand of Human Body Parts, Michele Goodwin has offered startling perceptions into the commercial nature of many 'altruistic' transactions. As editor of this nuanced but visionary volume ... [she] has gathered experts from various disciplines and stances: its writers are joined not by ideology but by their deep knowledge and an ability to keep you closely engaged through gripping case histories that read like novellas and inform like cutting-edge textbooks. Despite the authors' differing disciplines and stances, the book retains the harmony of a quilt, although its caveats provide little of its comfort. Several recent works have focused on life, health and the dollar, but this game-changing volume will take you where others don't.' Harriet A. Washington, author of Medical Apartheid and Deadly Monopolies 'Scientific advances are rapidly increasing the possibilities for our bodies and body parts to be shared with others. Within the professions rhetorical warfare has erupted with extreme options the norm. Pure altruism on the part of donors or free markets with bodies and body parts sold or rented to the highest bidder are proposed. The Global Body Market is an indispensable guide to avoiding the land mines and developing common sense policies that save lives and protect donors from exploitation and coercion.' Frances Kissling, President, Center for Health, Ethics and Social Policy 'Michele Goodwin captures the excruciatingly complex tension between the apparent altruism of those attempting to provide safe, ethical, and professional transplantation options and those preying upon the sick, frightened, and dying. Professor Goodwin is a medico-legal sleuth, bringing together world-class experts from multiple fields in a collaborative effort to inform and educate us - brilliantly - about this translucent world where law, medicine, public health, crime, life, and death intertwine.' George Woods, University of California Law School, Secretary General, International Academy of Law and Mental Health, and Fellow, American Psychiatric Association