Slashdot Mirror
Transplant Surgeon Called Dibs On Steve Jobs' Home
theodp writes "The Commercial Appeal reports that Dr. James Eason, the surgeon who performed Steve Jobs' liver transplant, found himself grilled at length Monday by Shelby County Commission members. The Univ. of Tennessee-Methodist Transplant Institute, which Eason heads, is in a bitter dispute over the distribution of human organs. Pressed for details by Commissioners West Bunker and Terry Roland about the 2009 liver transplant that Eason performed on the late Steve Jobs, Eason acknowledged that he's now living in the Memphis home that Jobs used during his convalescence. Bunker asked, "Was that a deal cut to get him a transplant here locally?" Eason: "I understand. It's a fair question. Absolutely not." Eason said a company lined up the housing for Jobs. "I took care of him and visited him in that home. And when I learned that it was going to be going on the market, I asked him, I asked the administrator of the LLC, if I could purchase it." So, is it time for Apple to shed some light on The Mystery of Steve Jobs' Memphis Mansion? It was reported that Apple lawyer George Riley, reportedly a friend of Eason's, helped Jobs with the arrangements for the Memphis mansion, which was acquired at a bargain price of $850,000 from the State of Tennessee by the mysterious LCHG, LLC on 3/26/2009. LCHG was formed on 3/17/2009, apparently just days before Jobs received his liver (on 3/21/2010, Jobs noted he was coming up on the 1-year anniversary of his transplant). Records show that title to the mansion was transferred to Eason in May, 2011, about three months after the National Enquirer painted a grim picture of Jobs' health. LCHG, LLC was dissolved in February 2012."
Badly written article. I have no idea what it means.
work in progress
Ok, so. It's a gossip piece, but it belongs on Slashdot's homepage because it involves Steve Jobs in a semi-tangential sort of way? Right, OK.
It is extremely common for people who happen to know another person to be cut a nice deal when selling property. In fact, I might even say that is normal. Jobs knew a guy, guy wanted to buy his house, Jobs sold it to him, end of story NO ONE GIVES A SHIT.
I'm not even sure what the summary is implying, and I really don't feel it is worth taking the time to find out. This isn't even "news", it's just sensationalistic crap (I'm assuming, I only skimmed the summary).
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
Let the litany of Jobs worshippers now feast upon all my +1 funnies with -1 overrateds. I suppose had I made a joke about how Apple's iDied product isn't selling so well, or another iSomething joke, it'd be -1000 flamebait and they'd have to call Malda out of retirement to help rewrite the code so it'd be more resistant to having everyone on the internet simultaniously facepalm, lol, and then -1 a single comment. *maniacal laugh* Soon my pretties...
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
fat lot of good it did him.
You begin to understand the problem, you just need to look a little bit further.
The system prioritizes those who could most benefit medically. That is, if you are likely to die even with the transplant, then you should be behind the person who might have a 80% chance of 20 or 30 more years of life with that same organ. If Jobs "greased the skids" to get himself to the head of the list even though he was likely to die with the transplant, then there are some serious questions to be answered.
Clearly the commissioners believe there is enough suspicion to investigate this more closely. It has the appearance of corruption on the part of the doctor and of Jobs.
Does Poe's Law apply to capitalists too?
I honestly can't tell if you're serious.
By telling poor people: "tough luck, organs are awarded based on ability to pay and nothing else"?
Why not? That is the way we distribute food, clothing and housing. Why should organs be different? What you are missing, is that if there were no artificial restrictions on organs, they would be far more plentiful. Most people don't check the donor box, because there is no incentive to do so. If they were prepaid $100, many more would do so.
That's pretty much how the world works.
And that is the way the world should work. People should be able to use money to buy things they want, encouraging more people to supply them. The problem here is that we have decided this shouldn't apply to organs, so the supply is severely restricted. If organs were treated like a normal commodity they would be far more plentiful because way more people would be donors.
The problem is that human organs are not a normal commidity. Money doesn't and shouldn't give you the right to someone's organs. Money doesn't make you more deserving of the right to live any more than money makes you more deserving of death. If you believe that if you are rich enough then you should be allowed to pay for the right to have, say, the organs that will be available once someone is taken off life support, you are not only putting pressure on a situation that already has deep ethical concern for the doctor and the patient's family, what you are in effect saying is that if you are rich enough, you should be allowed to pay to kill someone. To put it another way, if you believe it is ethical for you to be able to pay to have some available organ, then you must believe it is perfectly ethical that I can pay to prevent you from getting said available organ. Ultimately the argument for an organ market is an egocentric one, and it doesn't meet the criterial of universalization, meaning that what you wish is not applicable to all under similar circumstances, and it therefore cannot be ethical.
The Admin and the Engineer
As opposed to telling people at random, "Sorry, we know you were waiting on a heart transplant, but there are five people a month who will die without a heart transplant, but there are only two of the people a month who die actually signed up to be organ donors, even though there are ten a month whose hearts would be suitable for transplant."
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Many people don't check the donor box because they are appalled at the greedy doctors, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies making good money off of their donated organs. Ever check the price of a transplant?
If I used a sig over again, would anyone notice?
Since when is American health care system about "fair"? If you really wanted that, you'd have public healthcare long ago.