In my final publish, I put up a reply by Dr. Stanley Goldfarb to a bit I a publish on “Race, ‘Wokeness,’ and Kidney Transplant Shortages,” which was partly a critique of Dr. Stanley Goldfarb’s article on the identical topic, printed by the Metropolis Journal. On this publish, I supply a quick rejoinder to Dr. Goldfarb.
In his response, Dr. Goldfarb write that he doesn’t assist “a race-based components for figuring out kidney operate,” which in flip would have an effect on prioritization for kidney transplants. Fairly, he says he merely rejects claims that the race-based components not too long ago changed by the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Community (OPTN) and the United Community for Organ Sharing (UNOS), was racist, as a result of it deprived African-Individuals. He additionally object to the retroactive software of the brand new, race-neutral components to sufferers already on the transplant waitlist.
I admire Dr. Goldfarb’s clarification of his views. Nevertheless, it appears to me that, in his unique article, he did in reality object to the displacement of the outdated race-conscious components. Certainly, he described it (together with one other coverage change) as “maybe essentially the most harmful victory for wokeness in well being care so far.” Even in his reply, he continues to assist the usage of the race-based system for sufferers already on the waitlist. On the very least, his place strikes me as removed from an unequivocal rejection of racial discrimination.
As famous in my earlier publish, the usage of racial standards right here can maybe be defended on the bottom that this is likely one of the very uncommon instances the place there are genuinely vital bodily variations between racial and ethnic teams that have an effect on their probabilities of a profitable transplant. However, as additionally famous there, such an argument at the very least requires robust proof that there is no such thing as a different comparably correct approach to assess sufferers. As well as, as mentioned in my earlier piece, racial discrimination is especially indefensible in a state of affairs the place we are able to simply get rid of kidney shortages for sufferers of all races, just by legalizing organ markets.
Whereas Dr. Goldfarb and I’ll proceed to vary on the problem of racial discrimination, there are some factors of settlement between us, as nicely, additionally coated in my earlier piece. For instance, we agree it might be a mistake to cut back the precedence given to kidney donors within the waitlist, as a way to promote racial “fairness.”