Doctors charge around 1,660 dollars for the surgery. The trade also involves the agents who seek out potential donors, and the paid donors. For many donors, the price paid for an organ could be more than they could save in a lifetime. These figures may vary depending on circumstances. In China, donors may not be so lucky.
Chinese prisoners have their organs removed upon death.
The transplant service is readily available to high ranking Party officials and cash-paying foreigners. There is also a market in Hong Kong, where only 50-60 kidneys are replaced each year, while the waiting list for transplant is around 500. In some cases organs may simply be ''stolen'' from dead donors. Last year the German magazine Der Spiegel investigated the autopsy trade in which human body parts are smuggled out of hospital morgues and sold to local drug companies. Muscle membranes from corpses thighs are sold to firms that market reconstructive surgery.