From an Intern Doctor's Suicide to Infant Kidney Transplant: Unveiling China's Organ Harvesting Industry
Huang Shiwei, vice chairman of the medical ethics nonprofit Taiwan International Organ Transplant Care Association, spoke on NTD's Health 1+1 program, saying that recent revelations surrounding the suspicious suicide of an intern doctor and the use of infants' kidneys for transplant have cast a stark light on how the CCP runs its illicit organ transplant industry.
'Donor Search' at Chinese Hospitals
A chilling revelation has emerged from the Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, where internal documents and audio recordings, made public by the father of the late medical intern Luo Shuaiyu on June 17, expose a systematic practice of illicit organ sourcing within Chinese hospitals.
Luo, a graduate student specializing in kidney transplantation, fell to his death from a building in May 2024, just weeks before his graduation.
After his death, his family discovered a trove of evidence on his computer implicating the Second Xiangya Hospital in illegal organ trafficking. His father, posting on Weibo, said that Luo refused to comply with hospital directives to source organs of untraceable origin, a stance that may have led to his death.
The Luo case, according to Huang, is indicative of a broader, troubling trend in Chinese medical institutions.
'Every hospital is searching for organs,' Huang said, 'They asked [Luo] to find child donors. Where was he supposed to look? Among the children being treated at the hospital, he was tasked with identifying suitable donors.'
Huang said Luo's refusal to participate in this ethically fraught practice led to intense pressure, culminating in his tragic death.
Luo's parents released three audio recordings that reveal the hospital's efforts to source child donors for transplantation and research. One recording details a directive for Luo to locate 12 child donors aged 3 to 9. According to his parents, Luo was pressured to fulfill this task in the months leading up to his graduation, with his academic grades and degree at risk if he failed to comply.
Facing suppression online, Luo's parents continue to seek justice, raising global awareness of the hospital's alleged involvement in illegal organ trafficking and coercive tactics to enforce compliance among medical staff.
Infant Kidneys Targeted
On May 21, 2024, Fudan University Medical College in Shanghai established a pediatric organ transplant center. While the hospital emphasized that the center was created to save sick children, Chinese parents increasingly fear that their loved ones are becoming targets for organ harvesting.
According to the university, Li Qian, CCP secretary at the pediatric hospital, claimed that 'in just over a year, [pediatric organ transplants] have exceeded 100 cases.' State media outlet Sina reported that the hospital has performed highly complex surgeries, including kidney transplants from donors weighing less than 5 kg (11 pounds), indicating that newborns are among the donors.
The practice of transplanting children's kidneys into adults has become routine in Chinese hospitals. In 2017, the First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou reported that 90 percent of pediatric kidney donors were allocated to adult patients.
A 2023 study by doctors from Shanghai Jiao Tong University's Renji Hospital, published in the American Journal of Transplantation, detailed two cases of kidney transplants from newborns born at 29 weeks and 29 weeks, 5 days to adult women aged 34 and 25 with end-stage kidney disease. The kidneys were harvested on the second and third days after birth, prompting ethical scrutiny.
Shabih Manzar, associate professor of clinical pediatrics at Louisiana State University, questioned the procedure in the same journal, noting that one of the 29-week preterm infants had no apparent life-threatening conditions, casting doubt on the decision to withdraw life-sustaining treatment.
Huang noted the high survival rates of 29-week preterm infants with modern medical technology.
'Whether it's the parents or the medical system, everyone would typically do everything possible to save these preterm newborns,' he said. 'No one would give up and simply designate them as organ donors. Yet, we see that they are using 29-week preterm infants as organ donors.'
China's Organ Harvesting Industry
2000–2006: Explosive Growth in Organ Transplants Following CCP's Persecution of Falun Gong
China's organ transplant industry, which began using organs from executed prisoners—including political prisoners and prisoners of conscience—following a 1984 regulation allowing organ procurement from executed prisoners, saw explosive growth after the CCP's persecution of Falun Gong began in 1999.
Huang noted that after former CCP leader Jiang Zemin initiated the persecution campaign against Falun Gong, practitioners were branded as 'class enemies,' making them prime targets for forced organ harvesting.
This period marked an unprecedented surge in organ transplants. According to data from the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong, compiled from Chinese state media reports, only 135 liver transplants were recorded in China over more than two decades before 1999, averaging five to six cases annually. In stark contrast, from 1999 to 2006, liver transplants skyrocketed to 14,085 cases over eight years, averaging more than 1,700 cases per year—a staggering 180-fold increase.
'Organ transplantation in China suddenly became a massive industry,' Huang said. 'With countless patients in China and worldwide needing organs, there are enormous commercial interests at play.'
2007: A Fault Line in Organ Shortage
In March 2006, a whistleblower using the pseudonym Annie, a former employee of Sujiatun Thrombosis Hospital in Shenyang, Liaoning Province, revealed to The Epoch Times the CCP's horrific practice of forced organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners. This exposure had a significant impact on China's organ transplant industry.
According to the China Liver Transplant Registry, cited by state media People's Daily, liver transplants peaked at 2,970 cases in 2005 and 2,781 in 2006 but fell by roughly one-third to 1,822 cases in 2007.
Huang attributed this decline to the 2006 revelations.
'The reason for the decrease in organ transplants in China in 2007 was the exposure of the CCP's forced organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners,' Huang said.
'As relatives relentlessly searched for family members detained for practicing Falun Gong, it became increasingly difficult for the CCP's public security and medical personnel to continue using Falun Gong practitioners' organs on such a large scale.'
He said the drop in transplant numbers underscores the international scrutiny and domestic pressure that began to disrupt the CCP's organ harvesting operations.
Expansion to More Victims
Facing international scrutiny and domestic pressure over its forced organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners, China's organ harvesting industry began targeting other vulnerable groups, including Uyghurs, and other ethnic groups, as well as young people, children, and infants.
Huang said: 'In most countries, organ donors tend to be older, 50, 60, or even 70 years old. But in China, the organ transplant industry operates differently. When organs are supplied to wealthy individuals, they naturally demand those from younger people. The focus has shifted to young individuals and, increasingly, to children.'
Recent years have seen a surge in mysterious disappearances of adolescents across multiple Chinese provinces. Despite China's extensive surveillance infrastructure—boasting the world's largest network of monitoring cameras, big data analytics, and facial recognition technology—these incidents remain unresolved, fueling public suspicion of forced organ harvesting.
In October 2022, Hu Xinyu, a first-year high school student in eastern China's Jiangxi Province, mysteriously disappeared from school. Various reports from insiders and overseas whistleblowers allege that the Hu case is linked to forced organ harvesting, a practice purportedly known within the local government. These claims suggest the existence of an organ trafficking network involving government officials, hospitals, and public security entities.
In August 2023, 8-year-old Wang Sijun, who had a rare Rh-negative blood type, died unexpectedly while receiving treatment at Yunnan Red Cross Hospital.
According to viral videos posted by her family on platforms such as Douyin, Wang was admitted for a routine examination while accompanying a relative, only to die in the nephrology ward. Her autopsy cited hemorrhagic shock as the cause of death, with traces of the anticoagulant enoxaparin sodium detected, leading her family to suspect blood extraction and organ theft.
Although no definitive evidence confirms organ harvesting in the case, Huang noted that widespread allegations of hospitals engaging in such practices have created a climate of heightened anxiety.
Documented cases, such as a fraudulent organ donation scandal in Anhui Province's Bengbu City, lend credence to these concerns. Between 2017 and 2018, six defendants, including four doctors, were convicted of deceiving families and illegally harvesting organs from at least 11 patients.
Huang said: 'China's organ transplant industry, driven by the Communist Party's ideology, has evolved into a vast commercial enterprise. These cases show it has become an unregulated beast, with rampant, unchecked organ harvesting.'
He further noted that the industry's expansion to new victim groups highlights a deepening ethical crisis in China's transplant system, raising critical concerns about oversight and accountability.
US Legislative Efforts to Counter Forced Organ Harvesting
As global awareness of forced organ harvesting grows, the United States is taking decisive steps to address the issue through robust legislation.
On May 7, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed the Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act of 2025 with a bipartisan vote of 406–1. The bill targets individuals involved in forced organ harvesting, imposing severe penalties such as asset freezes, financial transaction bans, and visa revocations. Currently, the legislation awaits a Senate vote.
During a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on May 21, Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) urged Senate support for the bill. In response, Secretary of State Marco Rubio called forced organ harvesting concerning and pledged to advocate for the legislation's passage in the Senate.
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