Bone and Skin Tissue Removed from a Donated Dead Body

The police prosecuted doctors and nurses who sold a skin tissue and bond removed from a dead body which was freely donated for a medical research, and presidents medical companies which have produced and sold the medical supplies required for a plastic surgery by using them.

Seoul metropolitan police agency booked 12 people including the presidents of the companies which has manufactured the medical supplies, and doctors & nurses who illegally supplied the skin tissue of the dead body to the company, on a charge of a breach of Pharmaceutical Affaire Law and the Waste Management Act on January 7.

According to the police, Mr. Hwang, one of the above restricted people was charged of selling the medical supplies with skin tissues amounting to 1.92 billion won from May 2000 up to now as he received the skin tissue removed from the dead body for the medical research from the doctor Ahn of ‘C’ hospital in November 2000 and manufactured the pharmaceuticals of ‘SureDerm’.

As the result of the police’s investigation, he gave a donation of 25 million won to ‘C’ college of medicine.

Ms. Kim who was the nurse in ‘C’ social welfare corporation was charged of gathering the skin tissues removed from five dead bodies and supplying them to ‘H’ company by playing a role in connecting the donation of internal organs.

In addition, Mr. Ahn who was president of ‘Y’ hospital was charged of supplying six bones taken from the hip surgery of six patients to ‘H’ company, and Mr. Seo, president of ‘H’ Clinic sold 60 placentas to ‘H’ company with 5,000 won per placenta.

In particular, Mr. Hwang, president of ‘H’ company bought two unknown dead bodies for 12 million won from ‘K’ hospital of China last September and cut off the skin tissues and carried them in Korea.

The police official said, “The dead body for the medical research must be used as the free transplantation surgery upon a wish of a bereaved family, or used for the postmortem examination for the medical development. The restricted doctors used the dead body for a purpose of money-making and cheated the bereaved family as a cremation.”

He added, “Because the current regulation doesn’t include provisions related to a treatment of dead body for the medical research, we cannot apply the breach suspicion of the Pharmaceutical Affaire Law and the Waste Management Act. So, an establishment of the related regulation is emergent.”

Besides, there is a doubt of an incident minimization as the prosecution turned down a filing of written order many times and ordered the non-restraint investigation.

Hoon Lee dreamland@donga.com