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The report of an inquiry conducted by the Indian Medical Association into a kidney transplantation controversy in Kerala has raised several eyebrows in the medical fraternity.
The controversy started after media reports suggested the existence of a kidney racket in the state with the active involvement of doctors and private hospitals, adding that majority of the kidneys had come from a small tribal settlement in Idukki district.
Following this, the IMA had volunteered to conduct an inquiry. A three-member ethics committee that was set up came out with its report confirming the existence of a racket, but firmly ruled out the involvement of doctors and hospitals.
The inquiry committee had found that kidneys, used in the case of 11 transplantations performed at the Baby Memorial Hospital and the PVS Hospital, Kozhikode and the National Hospital, Kannur, were traded in violation of the Transplantation of Human Organs Act 1994.
The report, however, did not find any lapse on the part of the doctors in their failure to elicit the illegal transaction from either the donors or recipients. It has let off the authorisation committee, which was supposed to ensure that the kidneys were genuinely donated as per the 1994 Act, with a minor indictment.
Senior doctors view the inquiry team's clean chit as a poor exercise to exonerate the medical community of its accountability in the illegal kidney deals.
"I honestly believe that the IMA has sought to cover up the sensitive issue by putting the entire blame on unscrupulous middlemen and poor tribesmen. Were the doctors so dull not to suspect money transaction when poor tribesmen from far away Idukki came forward to donate their kidneys to patients in the northern districts? The IMA has apparently tried to portray the surgeons as idiots," Dr Soman, a well-known health expert and chairman of the Health Action by People, said.
Dr Soman said that organisations like IMA would be doing a 'big disservice' to the medical community if they tried to 'cover up the lapses' on the part of doctors and hospitals.
What has astonished some members of the medical fraternity was the refusal by the ethics committee to probe a compliant, lodged by one Mohan, that he was induced and threatened by the doctors when he refused to give his kidney.
The committee had dismissed his complaint as a mere allegation.
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