2. North Texas has turned to unclaimed bodies for economic reasons.
On paper, the Health Sciences Center’s agreement with Dallas and Tarrant counties offered a practical solution to a costly problem: Local coroners and medical examiners across the country shoulder the heavy costs of burying or cremating tens of thousands of unclaimed bodies each year — disproportionately black, male, mentally ill, and homeless — and often when the families of these bodies cannot be contacted or are unable or unwilling to pay for the cremation or burial costs.
By sending these bodies to the Health Science Center, Dallas and Tarrant counties each saved $500,000 a year on burials and cremations, and in return the center got what one program official called “valuable materials” for free to train future doctors.
The center used some of the bodies to teach medical students, while others were distributed to medical training and technology companies, including several industry giants, that use human remains to develop products and train doctors in how to use them.
The supply of unclaimed bodies helped bring in about $2.5 million a year in revenue from outside groups, according to Health Sciences Center financial records.
3. The recipient who paid the Health Sciences Center for the body did not know that the body was unclaimed.
Ten companies, teaching hospitals and medical schools that had entrusted human specimens to the Health Sciences Center told NBC News they were unaware the center was providing unclaimed bodies, prompting several agencies, including the Army, to pledge to review their internal policies.
DePuy Synthes, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary, said it was suspending its relationship with the center after learning it had received body parts from four unclaimed people. Boston Scientific, which owns Relivant MedSystems, which has used the torsos of more than two dozen unclaimed corpses, told NBC News it was reviewing its relationship with the center.
Some recipients, including the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, said they assumed all the bodies were donated voluntarily for medical purposes because the University of North Texas office that provided the specimens is called the “body donation program.”
Dr Douglas Hampers, CEO of the National Bioskills Institute, which leased Honey’s torso, said he was upset to learn his company had received an unclaimed body. The company assured him it would not accept any more unclaimed bodies and would adopt a policy of only donating bodies with the permission of the family.
“I don’t think we should have to infringe on family rights to train doctors,” he said.
4. Researching unclaimed bodies violates modern ethical guidelines
The practice of using unclaimed bodies dates back to a darker history, long before the advent of voluntary body donation programs, when U.S. medical schools relied on “resuscitationists” and “body snatchers” who exhumed the graves of the poor and former slaves.
To curb this horrific 19th century practice, states passed laws giving schools the authority to use unclaimed bodies for training students or experiments. Many of these laws are still in effect today, but the medical community largely ignores them.
The American College of Anatomists issued guidelines on human body donation last year, saying, “In the interest of justice, unclaimed or unidentified individuals should not be accepted into a donation program.” In the absence of federal data on the use of unclaimed bodies, NBC News surveyed more than 50 leading U.S. medical schools. All 44 that responded said they do not use unclaimed bodies, and some condemned their use.
“These people have not consented and therefore should not be used in any shape or fashion,” said Thomas Champney, a professor of anatomy at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, who studies the ethical use of the human body.
5. The NBC News poll had an immediate, transformative effect.
During the months of NBC News’ investigation, Health Sciences Center officials defended their practices, arguing that using unclaimed bodies was essential to training future doctors. But on Friday, after reporters detailed the investigation, the center announced it would immediately end the body donation program and fire the staff who led it.
The center said it has also hired a consulting firm to investigate the program’s operations, finding that NBC News failed to meet “the standards of respect, sensitivity and professionalism we demand.”
Before the Health Sciences Center announced it was halting the program, Dallas and Tarrant county officials said they were reconsidering their contracts to send unclaimed bodies to the center in light of the reporters’ findings. Dallas County commissioners recently postponed a vote on whether to extend the contract. Tarrant County’s top elected official, Judge Tim O’Hare, said he plans to explore legal options “to put an end to any immoral, unethical and irresponsible conduct resulting from this program.”
“An individual’s remains may not be used for medical research or sold for commercial purposes without the individual’s consent while alive or the consent of their next of kin,” O’Hare’s office said.
The two counties are scheduled to discuss the issue on Tuesday.
