New Lows in Reality TV?

CNN is reporting that Dutch TV will air a show this week called "Big Donor Show." The lucky winner of this show will walk away with the kidney of a woman with an inoperable brain tumor. The show, ostensibly to raise awareness for the "lottery" that is organ donation, has caused quite a tizzy over there, with members of Parliament up in arms, etc. She must give the kidney away while she's living in order to get around the socialized medicine system that has made the Netherlands, according to the article, a place where "waiting lists are more than four years long and 200 patients die annually for lack of a donor."

Seems reasonable to me that she should be able to give away her kidney to the winner of this little show. Likewise, people should be free, if the spirit moves them, to idle away their time and watch the show. They should even be free - and this is what I thought was the most interesting thing in the article - to pay the exorbitant price of $1.35 per text message to vote on who gets the kidney - even when the producers freely admit that the text votes will not determine who the winner is!

My recommendation? Everyone in the Netherlands should give $1.35 to groups working to end socialized medicine, so that instead of saving 1 person once, they could pursue new options to prevent the deaths of 200 patients a year for whom waiting is the only option.

(extra credit reading for those interested: A Wall Street Journal op-ed from 2001 on how socialized medicine in The Netherlands has changed people's conscience on euthanasia.)