Taiwan harvests organs from executed death row inmate

A hospital in Taiwan harvested organs and other body parts from one of six executed death row inmates, in a controversial procedure that could help five patients, local media reported Sunday.

Taiwanese authorities executed six death row prisoners Friday, the largest number to be put to death in one day in recent years, amid an ongoing debate about the maintenance of capital punishment.

Three inmates had agreed to donate their organs but doctors only harvested material from one of them, the United Daily News said.

Chen Chin-huo, convicted of murdering a woman and cooking her flesh, had his liver, two kidneys, corneas and bone removed, the newspaper reported.

“The donation will benefit at least five patients waiting for transplanting of organs,” it said, without identifying the hospital where the procedure took place.

The Kaohsiung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital in the south refused to harvest organs from a second inmate.

Lin Hsin-yi, of the Taiwan Alliance to End Death Penalty, told news agency AFP that death row inmates had to give consent for their organs to be removed but that some doctors refused to perform such operations.