Should People be Allowed To Sell Their Organs?

How much would it take for you to consider selling your bone marrow? A U.S. appeals court puts the price at about $3,000 in a ruling that now makes it legal to pay donors for their bone-marrow tissue.

The court's decision may well help thousands of sick patients who need bone-marrow transplants to survive, but it also begs the question, What other body parts might next be up for sale?

The ruling came about at the end of 2011, in a decision to an October 2009 lawsuit brought by a group of cancer patients, parents and bone-marrow-donation advocates against the government over the federal law banning the buying and selling of bodily organs. The plaintiffs were led by Doreen Flynn, who has three daughters who suffer from Fanconi anemia, a blood disorder that requires bone-marrow transplants to treat.

Flynn and the other plaintiffs said that too many such patients die waiting for transplants and argued that we should be allowed to pay people to donate their marrow as a way of ensuring a more reliable supply. The U.S. Court...