Shocking reports have recently detailed how Chinese ships are systematically looting maritime war graves for steel from sunken WWII ships. It’s also widely-known that a massive, shocking illegal organ-harvesting industry exists in China. Prisoners, even religious and political dissidents and other enemies of the regime are allegedly used as fodder for “donated” organs.
Little surprise, then, that Hong Kongers are fleeing that city’s organ donation register in droves since Beijing’s takeover.
Naturally, the CCP’s enforcers are not happy.
Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee condemned an unusual rise in the number of withdrawal requests to the city’s organ donation system, saying Tuesday that police would investigate suspicious cases.
HK’s organ donation system is opt-in. Thousands of the 357,000 registered donors are suddenly opting out.
According to the government, the city’s centralized organ donation registration system received nearly 5,800 withdrawal applications in the five months since December.
What changed in December?
The government raised the possibility of establishing an organ transplant mutual assistance program with mainland China.
The Chief Executive raised suspicions about many of the applications, half of which were found to be either duplicate applications, or from people who had never opted in.
What appears to be happening is that dissident Hong Kongers have discovered a new, “soft” means of resisting the Chinese Communist Party — by clogging up its system with paperwork.
The government also issued a strong-worded statement Monday, saying it could not rule out that a small number of people made withdrawal attempts in a bid to undermine the reputation of the system, and to increase administrative burden. Without naming any platforms or any individuals, it said it noticed a small number of people had distorted the virtue of organ donation by promoting the idea that donors should scrutinize the identity of the recipients online. Some also urged others to withdraw from the system, it added. On Hong Kong’s Reddit-like forum LIHKG — where pro-democracy supporters discussed strategies for the 2019 anti-government movement — some users were skeptical about the proposed system. Others posted a link for making withdrawals from the register.
DevDiscourse
Organ donations have been met with resistance in both Hong Kong and China because of an ingrained cultural desire to keep bodies intact […]
The political row over the proposed mutual assistance program reflected some Hong Kongers’ distrust of China’s health system, as well as their grievances toward Beijing, which has cracked down on the city’s pro-democracy movement with a sweeping national security law.
Hong Kong’s medical standards are considered some of the highest in the world. While China’s medical system has advanced over the past few decades, many Hong Kongers remain skeptical about its health care services.
ABC News
It almost certainly doesn’t help that John Lee is widely seen as being a Beijing enforcer. Lee was the unopposed candidate in last year’s election.
With a reputation of being hardline pro-Beijing, he is expected to oversee the further integration of the special administrative region into the mainland.
Experts say Beijing’s endorsement of Mr Lee signals the central government is looking for someone reliable to ensure that its authority in Hong Kong is never questioned again.
ABC Australia
Just the sort of bloke you’d want to have control of what happens to your organs, whether you’re conveniently dead or not.