Premortem Donation

Over at Anchor Rising Monique Chartier has a post reporting on a proposal by a professor of bioethics at Brown University to allow the harvesting of both kidneys from brain trauma patients on life support.  The patient would then be removed from life support so that he could die from his brain injury and not from losing both kidneys.  This rather chilling suggestion put me in mind of this bit from The Meaning of Life:

So once again life imitates art.  We ought to give careful thought to what happens if premortem donation is combined with government control of health care.  I know that sounds paranoid but I've lived long enough to see ideas once dismissed as paranoia become reality.