England’s Chief Medical Officer Recommends Presumed Consent for Organ Donation

England’s Chief Medical Officer has recommended implementing an opt-out organ donation system. In other words, a person is presumed to be an organ donor unless the person expressly provides that he or she does not wish to be an organ donor.  See On the state of public health: Annual report of the Chief Medical Officer , July 17, 2007.2006

According to David Undis, Presumed consent, LifeSharers, July 17, 2007:

If this system was implemented in the United States, the supply of organs for transplant operations would increase significantly. According to polls, about 90% of Americans support organ donation but only about 50% have bothered to register. If everybody was automatically registered, few people would bother to un-register.

Presumed consent can only be implemented in the United States through legislative action — Congress [or state legislatures] would have to pass a law. The chances of this happening in the foreseeable future are somewhere between very slim and none, because there is wide-spread opposition to the idea of presumed consent.