They should have given this 22-year-old alcoholic a liver

Gluckman says:

12:33pm | 22/07/09

I think the question needs to be asked however ‘Who was saved because Gary Reinbach died? As you say there is a limited number of organs out there in the world.

Although I do agree, this is a very ugly can of worms the British health services has opened…

Nathan says:

12:35pm | 22/07/09

Your comment:Perhaps you could have offered him your liver, Tors. Giving an alchoholic a new liver is the same as giving a pack a day smoker new lungs. What sort of message is that? Go out and treat your body as trash as possible, there are spare parts waiting for you. No. He deserved to die.

jg_rat says:

01:02pm | 22/07/09

“Seserved to die” is a bit strong, Nathan.
Certainly there would have been others more deserving of a chance of life, with greater chances of survival

iansand says:

01:27pm | 22/07/09

You are absolutely correct.  This man should have had a liver available for transplant.  Everyone who needs a transplant should get one. 

Now I have that particular flight of fancy out of the way, how does one allocate otherwise scarce resources?  Someone will always miss out.  I can imagine the furore if a lottery was used.  You would have a field day complaining about gambling with people’s lives.

The criteria used here are distasteful but rational.

Stephen says:

01:36pm | 22/07/09

Tory entirely neglects to mention this little factoid from the linked Guardian article: 

“For every person lucky enough to get a new liver, 20 others with liver disease will die.”

If Tory was asked to rank the 21 candidates in order of priority, is she saying that being an extreme alcoholic isn’t a characteristic she’d take into account?

Que cera says:

01:37pm | 22/07/09

When there’s an abundance of donors I’ll agree with the commentary. You don’t think he was told he’d die from his actions before he found himself in the ‘no return’ chute?. This kid, no matter how sad the story, made a conscious decision AND effort to throw his life away with knowledge of consequence.

Michael says:

01:46pm | 22/07/09

No, I’m sorry Tory I usually agree with you, but this is Darwin’s law at its finest, dead beat mum dead meat son, alcoholics can rot where they fall as far as I’m concerned.

Anthony says:

02:14pm | 22/07/09

It’s not like livers are in over-supply.  Who would have missed out if the liver went to Gary? 

Organ recipients are assessed on several fronts for their suitability for transplant.  Lifestyle is just one aspect and not likely on its own to cause him to be knocked back.

Anthony says:

02:17pm | 22/07/09

“he had signed up for Alcoholics Anonymous”

You have to “sign up” now?  Sounds like excuses…

SD says:

02:34pm | 22/07/09

Certainly, this kid chose to be an alcoholic, just like many people who choose to have depression or schizophrenia. The homeless man I saw this morning no doubt chose to be homeless as well. As did that person with narcolepsy - the one wearing the bike helmet around. Or for that matter, the chap who chose motor neuron disease, a decision he may not live to regret. So much choice!

Razor says:

02:41pm | 22/07/09

This was the best decision.  Very sad for the family and the chap who died.

Krys says:

02:45pm | 22/07/09

I understand the point you are making but due to the fact organ transplants are scarce, some sort of allocation process is required. It might be an “ugly” truth but others are more deserving. His family should be faced with a ‘please explain’...

Hayley says:

02:53pm | 22/07/09

As someone in the medical professionI’ve noticed general consensus towards organ transplants are that they are often given to people who ‘do not deserve’ or ‘cause more suitable candidates to miss out’. Who are we to judge who does or does not deserve a transplant? Who are we to say that this young man could not treat his new liver with the respect it deserves? Also its not like they fall out of the sky, he may have died waiting for one had they said yes.

Kate says:

03:46pm | 22/07/09

Bet you his mum is now upset that she didn’t intervene earlier….like when her 13 year old started drinking alcohol.

Pricey says:

04:20pm | 22/07/09

Gluckman is correct….... As a realist, i would almost guarantee that another person was not saved by this young Gentleman being unworthy of a transplant and missing out.
Doctors saving lives with transplants and other marvelous medical advances is not playing God. The bureaucratic BS in medicine is playing God…...

Elle says:

04:42pm | 22/07/09

How’s the atmosphere up there on the high moral ground people? Getting enough oxygen? I’m glad I’m not asking any of you for a second chance on anything. Whew!

T.C. says:

05:01pm | 22/07/09

I’ve seen people get into TAFE courses who didn’t deserve to do so, because they had a track record of not finishing the course in which they applied, and it was sad that others far more deserving missed out on the chance.

He didn’t treat his first liver with the respect it deserved, I highly doubt that he would have done the same for the next.

Rob says:

05:30pm | 22/07/09

Who would you choose to have died?

Very easy to take a shot at doctors and the system in general when you’re just a journalist.  I’m guessing you didn’t make the required entry score for medicine, even if we look at 2nd and 3rd tier unis.

Unlike sensationalist journos medicos have to make, and be responsible for, life and death decisions.  The simple fact is there are not enough organs of any type to go around, livers included.  Thus the medical factors are weighed up in accordance with the chance of survivability, the social factors of life and longevity are considered and a decision made.

This poor bugger failed to meet the criteria because of his own choice to drink so heavily his liver failed in the first place.  Giving him a transplant would deny someone who meets the criteria for longevity that chance.

Are you sure you want to stick with your position?

Que cera says:

05:38pm | 22/07/09

SD says:

“Certainly, this kid chose to be an alcoholic, just like many people who choose to have depression or schizophrenia.”

No, he chose to skull a bottle of vodka every day.

SD says:

06:09pm | 22/07/09

Que cera:

You have absolutely missed my point.

Julie Coker-Godson says:

06:22pm | 22/07/09

No doctor should have the right to refuse a medical procedure that would otherwise have saved a person’s life purely on moral grounds: that would be playing God which, by the way, is what both the law and the medical profession condemn when Philip Nitschke advocates euthanasia for terminally patients wishing to “die with dignity”. Murder! the police cry - or manslaughter! Then there are motorists who are obliged by law to stop and assist following a motor vehicle accident if they have witnessed same.  Failure to do so can result in prosecution.  Who are we to decide who should and who should not have a transplant?  Where did this attitude come from that says: if you smoke, you cannot have a lung transplant and so on.  I can only hope that those of you with this attitude have an extremely holistic lifestyle, lest you find yourselves in this young man’s position.  Stop with the blame game and exercise some compassion.

Steve says:

06:23pm | 22/07/09

Who was saved as a result of this bureacratic (i.e non medical) decision ?

Probably a long-term alcoholic in his 60s who’d managed to wean himself off the booze for long enough to qualify for a transplant.

In the end, medical staff should make the decision as to who gets a transplant and who doesn’t, not faceless career bureucrats with no medical training to speak of.

Darrin says:

06:29pm | 22/07/09

What was going on at home during the years from 13-18?? What was his mother and father doing to prevent this tragedy? His mother sat beside his bed and blamed the health system for failing her son, but what about accepting some of the blame herself?

David says:

08:31pm | 22/07/09

It’s a tragedy that this man died enjoying something far too greedily, hence becoming addicted and out of control, that we do more often than we should. I do agree that organs should be given out on the basis that people won’t wreck them, and give them to people who have the greatest chance of survival with them. He wasn’t given a chance to prove he was desperate to live again, however others did. Tough luck, welcome to life and death man.

Jeremy says:

11:23pm | 22/07/09

Slow forms of suicide deserve as little respect as fast ones. The universe demands that you try or die. He made the second choice.

Ryan says:

04:52am | 23/07/09

if there was one liver and a choice of two people desperate for it and one was had drank their liver away and the other hadn’t…  well its not a hard or unfair choice is it?

Colton says:

04:55am | 23/07/09

Having seen my 11 year old niece die while waiting for a suitable donor for transplant I would be pissed off to say the least to see someone with such disregard for his own well being being given a second chance while others miss out. The simple fact is that donated and transplantable organs are in short supply and inevitably some will miss out. I wonder if you would have the same view if Gary Reinbach recieved a transplant while one of your relatives was waiting for an organ simply to satisfy your desire to give an excessive alcoholic a ‘second chance’?

Rod says:

08:48am | 23/07/09

Rock star David Crosby was given a liver in his 50s despite all the drugs that he’d used, likewise soccer star George Best who continued to booze on even after atransplant and died as a result of continued boozing and a kidney infection.
Gary Reinbach was a young man who deserved to live. He had an addiction that he could well have overcome.
Most criminals - especially young ones - are given a second chance even though their actions have harmed others. Gary was no criminal and the only person his actions harmed were himself. Thanks to red tape that harm was fatal.

Dan says:

10:10am | 23/07/09

If you are ritch and famous you will get a liver.  Everyone and everything has a price.  Moral reasoning only applies to less fortunate.  If this was Ms Winehouse she would be recovering from a transplant surgery by now.  Which I wouldn’t be suprised if it actually happened in the next 10 years.

fehowarth says:

10:23am | 23/07/09

Is the over use of alcohol at his young age the only cause of liver failure,?Cannot help to think he may have had other liver complaints that was exacerbrated by the alcohol.  Is it common for 22 year olds to suffer from this complaint, with or witout alcohol.  Maybe it is better to give the liver to a 22 year old instead of someone in their late fifties.

Nicci says:

10:56am | 23/07/09

Honestly, do any of you really believe half the things you are saying. This person was merely a child, a child with a problem. We will never know if he cleaned himself up or if he would have wasted the donor liver. He is dead because he was too ill to prove he could help himself. Its a disgrace and a disgust. My heart goes out to all affected by his tragic case, and i hope those that feel justice has been served have a good hard think about how they would feel if this was them or their child.

Barbara says:

02:57pm | 23/07/09

I agree with you Nicci.  Hopefully now this young man is in a much more compassionate place where pompous people with their holier-than-thou attitudes are nowhere to be found.

Rest in Peace Gary and condolences to those who did care.

stephen says:

03:47pm | 23/07/09

They should have given this 22 year old a mother.

stephen says:

03:53pm | 23/07/09

... And what universe is that Jeremy ; this one or the one you’re living on ?

Sam says:

07:57pm | 12/08/09

It is a sad story, but criteria for the allocation of organs are there for a reason. I wonder if this case has received so much media coverage because of Gary’s age, people, generally, feel more compassion for the young, with what is viewed as a “full life ahead of them”. When someone who is older and denied an organ, is there such an uproar? That person could live another good 20 or 30 years. The fact is that as so many have mentioned before, livers for transplantation are scarce. The way it is decided who will receive the transplant when a liver becomes available is determined by - survival chances; without the liver and post transplant , likely prospect of compliance with the lifelong immunosuppressant drugs needed post transplant. This unfortunate young man according to journalists did not have had the chance to prove himself and remain abstinant for the required 6 months, but he had 9 years to sign up and attend AA meetings.

ted says:

10:12pm | 12/01/10

My dad is currently waiting for liver because of NASH. A genetic decease caused liver decease. He now lies in a bed in hospital with only weeks to live and with no answer other than a liver tranplant will extend his life.
So the lad had some issues and an extension of his life he may have been able to get his sh$t together. It’s tragic when life is lost for what ever reason. What would be apparent is this “boy” had been allowed to stray from what we concider a healthy and normal up bringing.
This story could be conceived to have many morals to it, what I would say is appreciate life to the point that you love your childrens life as much or more than your own. If your luckly enough to be offered an extension life when terminal then be greatful rather than resentful if not.
For what ever reasons that life is lost we should be sorry for the lost and compasionate to those who are ignirate enough to think some should decide who lives and dies, I wouldn’t want that job because when your looking down the barrel you’ll be sorry like I would be for what ever I have done.
May he rest in place where he is happy.