Eye foundation faces suit for taking teen’s eyes
The brother of an 18-year-old Makati youth leader whose eyes were taken after his death by the Eye Bank Foundation of the Philippines (EBFP) without his family’s permission described the incident as an “eye opener.”
“It is an eye opener for everybody. This must have happened to other families, not only our own,” Michael, the older brother of Sangguniang Kabataan chair Jason Patrick Infante, told reporters during a briefing in Quezon City Monday.
He added that he and his parents intend to file charges against the foundation as well as the individuals who stole his brother’s eyes.
At the same time, they urged Congress to conduct a probe of the method by which the foundation harvests corneas, its donors and recipients and if the families of the donors gave their consent before the procedure.
On August 12, Infante—the SK chair of Barangay Valenzuela in Makati City—was on patrol with two other barangay officials when they encountered a man and a woman who were drinking and smoking out in the street at 2 a.m.
A police report said the three politely reminded the couple about a barangay ordinance on public drinking. However, the man identified as 21-year-old John Paul Comora was irked and attacked the three officials with a knife. Infante sustained stab wounds along with one of his companions and died at a nearby hospital.
His body was later taken to a funeral parlor for autopsy during which two personnel of the Eye Bank, according to the victim’s family, harvested his eyes after passing themselves off as policemen or asking for their permission even though they (family members) were just standing outside the morgue.
Corky Infante-Hernandez. Infante’s aunt, told reporters that the Eye Bank must be made to account for all the corneal extractions it made in its 18 years of operation as a nonstock and nonprofit organization.
Challenge to foundation
Saying that it is illegal to extract organs without prior consent, she pushed for the strict monitoring of the foundation’s activities as she challenged its founder and president, Dr. Minguita Padilla, to produce the group’s records.
Joni, the victim’s mother who is a registered nurse, told the Inquirer that when members of the foundation arrived at Funeraria Filipinas on JP Rizal Street in Makati City, where the autopsy was conducted, they were with Scene of the Crime Operatives (Soco).
“There were four men. One was the embalmer, the three others introduced themselves as Soco personnel. I wanted to follow them inside the room but I felt I could not bear seeing my son being cut up so I stayed outside the embalming area. The four men also told me that it was prohibited for people to enter the embalming area so I did as they said,” Joni recalled.
She said that they later learned that of the three Soco personnel, only one was really from the police while the two others were from the Eye Bank. This was after they found out that her son’s eyes were missing.
“They did not just take his corneas, they took his eyes. They were replaced with artificial eyes. Even I was afraid because my son looked like a freak,” she added.
What was worse, she said, was that the extraction of the eyes was obviously not done by a professional as there was a white gelatin-like substance left in her son’s sockets.
When she sought an explanation from the foundation, the police and the funeral parlor, their representatives told her that apart from Republic Act No. 7885 or the Organ Donation Act of 1991, there was an existing memorandum of agreement which authorizes the foundation to extract corneas even without the consent of the victim’s relatives in cases involving violent deaths.
The family’s lawyer, Claire Castro, pointed out, however, that under RA 7885, the extractor “must exhaust all remedies to locate relatives within 12 hours and seek permission for the [procedure]. It should also be done with the advice of a physician and approved by the head of the hospital which means that it should only be done in a hospital and no other place. The procedure must also be done by an ophthalmic surgeon or a trained expert with at least two years of training,” she said.
According to her, the Infantes may sue for damages and possibly file a qualified theft case against the people responsible for stealing the victim’s eyes.
PMA sides with foundation
For its part, the Philippine Medical Association (PMA) said that it found nothing wrong in the Eye Bank’s actions even though the extraction was done without the family’s consent.
According to PMA governor for Metro Manila and orthopedic surgeon Dr. Leo Olarte, under RA 7885 or the Act to Advance Corneal Transplantation, “hospital officials or the designated doctors in custody of the dead can authorize in a public document the removal of the corneas within 12 hours after the death.”
“There is no liability on [the foundation’s] part. The law gives permission to the doctors to remove the corneas of those who died in trauma, accident and medico-legal cases,” he said.
“If the Eye Bank did not seek permission, it’s okay. In the absence of a waiver, the doctors can still remove the corneas within 12 hours,” Olarte stressed.
He pointed out, however, that the Eye Bank may have ignored one provision in the law which states that doctors must “exert earnest effort to locate the relatives of the dead within 48 hours from death.”
In addition, the removal of the cornea should not interfere with an ongoing investigation nor alter the facial appearance of the dead.
“They may have violated a provision but RA 7885 or even the previous law amended (RA 7170 or the Organ Donation Act of 1991) did not mention anything about penalties or punishment,” he said.
