“I had no money. It was a free cremation.”
–Tina Johnson, after the death of husband Kerry
Kurt Hollstein was an Army veteran dying of cancer. He decided to donate his body for medical research. His granddaughter witnessed his signature on the forms and his definite answer of no to military experimentation. Hollstein was bitter about his health care experiences with the Veterans Administration.
His remains were used in a military project without his consent.
“This is almost beyond belief that his entire body went somewhere else without his permission,” His granddaughter Marla Yale told Reuters.com. “And especially to a place that he absolutely did not want to be.”
Mr. Hollstein donated his remains to Biological Resource Center. His donation was not the only one donated without permission.
Reuters News Agency has recently done an extensive investigation into the body and tissue donation industry. I have assisted their research with any knowledge I could provide. This is a continuing series of articles about the shocking sale of human tissue, some not following donor wishes and some without regard to the safety of this tissue.
The Atlantic magazine has also revealed the dark side of some body donation programs. Oregon, Arizona and Michigan programs became the focus of an FBI investigation.
In Michigan, Arthur Rathburn of International Biological, Inc. was their main study. He was a licensed Michigan embalmer whose place of practice was not a licensed funeral home but a body donation business. Their investigation found 1,000 parts of donors (arms, legs and heads), awaiting sales.
The Michigan Bureau of Corporations, Securities and Commercial Licensing revoked his licenses. He was ineligible for new licenses, ineligible to work for the state and fined $10,000.
The Bureau also found Rathburn guilty of “aiding and abetting another in engaging in the unlicensed practices of funeral directing and embalming; failing to comply with regulations of a state, affecting the handling, custody, care of a dead human body; and engaging in the practice of funeral directing from an unlicensed establishment.”
The FBI also investigated Oregon’s Health Legacy. Atlantic magazine states the investigation covered employee whistleblowers who “alleged that Legacy placed employees and medical students at risk of exposure to disease from cadavers and may have failed to obtain consent from families to use their relative’s corpses.”
The investigation continued to Biological Resource in Phoenix.
Doris Stauffer was suffering from dementia. Her son, Jim, wanted to donate her brain for Alzheimer’s research. A nurse gave them a brochure for Biological Resource Center. Jim signed the authorization forms for medical research of his mother’s remains. He checked a box prohibiting military, traffic-safety and other non-medical experiments.
Reuters researched the journey that Doris Stauffer’s remains took. Biological Resource Center (BRC) “detached one of Doris Stauffer’s hands for cremation.” Those were the ashes her son Jim received. BRC “sold and shipped the rest of Stauffer’s body to a taxpayer-funded research project for the US Amy.” He body was used to determine damage to the human body from roadside bombs.
It was revealed that her brain was never used for Alzheimer’s research.
Investigation by Reuters also revealed that 20 or more other donated remains were used by the military in these explosive experiments without permission from next of kin. The selling price for remains such as Mrs. Stauffer is $5,893.
Biological Resource Center priced out other body parts: spines for $1900, legs at $1300, and torsos at $3500. The now closed Center sold more than 20,000 parts from 5,000 donated bodies over the ten years in business.
“It was never about financial gain but rather a labor of love,” Biological Resources CEO Steve Gore wrote in an email to Reuters.
Infected tissue was also shipped. “Eye and ear tissue infected with Hepatitis B sent to researchers in Tucson; eyes from a body that test positive for Hepatitis C to Utah for use by a biomedical firm; and a left foot infected with Hepatitis B to a podiatry training center near Atlanta.”
Reuters reported government documents revealed that Rathburn’s International Biological, Inc. may have had 100 body parts that included hepatitis, HIV, sepsis, meningitis, MRSA and necrotizing fasciitis (flesh eating disease).
A 76-year old donated her body. Her brain was sent to the Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center in the Boston area. A blood sample was sent to a laboratory. The sample revealed Hepatitis B. A letter was sent to the family informing them and rejecting the use of the body. However, her brain was at the Brain Tissue Resource center. It was not Biological Resource Center that informed the center of the brain tissue’s Hepatitis diagnosis, but a Reuter’s reporter two years later.
The military, specifically the Army, experiments with test dummies and hi-tech mannequins but could not duplicate the damage of IED’s to flesh and bone. The Army’s policy requires full consent from donor families. Reuters showed that “bodies or body parts of 34 people were shipped to the military without donor permission.”
The Army depended on the donation forms provided to them by Biological Resource Center.
Medical schools are also purchasers of whole or body parts. Many of their programs depend on the availability of human remains for student training and research.
“It is not illegal to sell a whole body or the parts of a body for research or education,” Sheldon F. Kurtz, Iowa Law Professor, who helped modify the Uniform Anatomical Gift Act, told Reuters, “the issue of whole body bodies or parts for research or education never came up during our discussions.”
The need for donated tissue is clear. We all will receive benefits from the tissue or the knowledge it gives others.
What we need is also consistent regulation and a transparent and truthful donation process; Let a donating family decide what is fair with informed choices.
In Arizona, where it may be up to 20 percent of all deaths resulting in donations to research agencies, this is not an isolated small subject.
“It was a good idea. The cremation was free, and it was donating the body for medical purposes.”
–Mary Hughes on the death of her son Grady, after a hospice nurse gave her a brochure