What is the basis for the claim that the human body has a special ethical status which means that it should not be turned into a commodity?
Clearly, some things have an intrinsic value, which is separate from their cash value. Examples might include ecosystems and human beings. It is partly because parts of the human body have been part of a particular person that they have their own intrinsic value. That is why, for example, the parents of those children whose organs were removed without consent at the Alder Hey Hospital in Liverpool were very anxious to have those body parts returned to them so that they might be buried. You can call the parents’ feelings irrational, but they show the importance of other types of value than the cash price. The special status of human material, which depends on the special status of human beings, has been part of almost every culture, and is what underlies legal bans on trading in human material in many countries. It is widely felt that that special status is very important and must not be degraded by reducing human material to the same status as ordinary goods. It seems particularly impo
