1. What is the ‘cash for kidney’ racket?

The report has revealed that poor younger villagers from Myanmar are being flown to Apollo’s Delhi hospital and paid to donate their kidneys to wealthy sufferers around the globe. The racket entails “elaborate forging of identity documents and staging of ‘family’ photographs to present donors as the relatives of would-be patients,” it added.

A affected person can’t obtain an organ donation from a stranger in regular circumstances, beneath Indian and Burmese legal guidelines.

2. How do sufferers discover donors?

As a part of the investigation, one of many Telegraph’s reporter posed as a relative of a sick aunt, who urgently wanted a kidney transplant however had no relations in a position to donate. The reporter reached out to Apollo’s Myanmar places of work, and was advised {that a} “stranger would be sourced to donate their kidney.”

An Apollo agent then put the reporter in contact with a 27-year-old Burmese man, who mentioned he wanted to promote his kidney as his aged dad and mom have been “not in a good financial condition”.

The reporter was additionally advised {that a} affected person can select their donor after which prepare a cost to the person.

3. How a lot cash does it value to supply the kidney?

The head of Apollo’s Myanmar operation gave an “Apollo-branded costs document” to the undercover reporter. It talked about a number of bills concerning kidney transplantation — from the drawing up of a household tree (Rs 33,000) to flights (Rs 21,000 every method) and “registration for the medical board” (Rs 16,700).

The doc additionally mentioned a affected person can count on to incur, in complete, as much as (Rs 1,79,500). This, nonetheless, didn’t embody the cash given to a donor, which could possibly be round 70 or 80 lakh generally.

4. How is the system being gamed?

Once an upfront money cost is made, the donor is flown to India. The particular person, together with the affected person, then seems in entrance of the transplant authorisation committee for an interview.

The committee is answerable for reviewing the submitted paperwork and confirming the connection between the recipient and donor. It includes a central authorities officer, a state authorities officer, two retired IAS officers, and two hospital consultants who, whereas not on the hospital’s payroll, practise there as medical doctors.

However, one of many Apollo’s Myanmar brokers advised the reporter that the committee, which additionally consists of a number of Apollo Hospital officers, is “just a facade” and asks solely superficial questions in regards to the relationship between the affected person and donor.

The brokers additionally forge household bushes, family paperwork, marriage certificates and images to determine familial relationships between sufferers and paid donors.

“Household registrations, suggesting the donor and patient live together as relatives, are also created… These faked documents, along with a series of test results that confirm compatibility but not a genetic relationship, are then presented to the hospital authorisation committee for rubber-stamping,” in line with the investigation.

5. Are there any medical doctors concerned within the racket?

The Telegraph’s report has talked about the title of Dr Sandeep Guleria, who educated within the UK and is a recipient of the Padma Shri. Patients and brokers advised the newspaper that Guleria was the surgeon who performed the transplants.

The report additionally quoted Deccan Herald newspaper’s 2016 report, mentioning that Guleria “was expected to be summoned for questioning in connection to a separate kidney scandal linked to Apollo’s Delhi hospital.”

6. Have Apollo Hospitals been accused of being concerned in such a racket earlier than?

In 2016, two of Apollo’s secretarial employees on the Indraprastha Hospital have been arrested alongside a gang of brokers and donors for allegedly being concerned in a kidney racket. An investigation into the accused is but to be concluded.