Organs of UK Nuclear Workers Secretly Harvested; Energy Secretary Apologizes 309
fernlyn writes with word of a report detailing a decades-long practice of clandestine post-mortem organ removal from the bodies of dozens of workers in the UK's nuclear energy industry; Britain's Energy Secretary Chris Huhne has apologized to the families of those workers whose organs were taken without consent or even acknowledgement. Many of the organs taken were removed without any apparent forensic purpose in mind. Surviving relatives are understandably upset with what they see as cavalier treatment of their loved ones' bodies (even beyond unauthorized organ removal), such as the replacement of bones with lengths of broomstick.
Re:What the hell is the fuss about (Score:5, Informative)
It makes a difference to a lot of people.
Have you ever seen what they do to bodies in an autopsy?
Re:What the hell is the fuss about (Score:3, Informative)
Actually in the bible it specifies that as much as possible and as intact as possible of the body has to be buried.
For that reason when there is a suicide attack in israel you see orthodox jews arrive to gather all bits of the victims to ensure compliance to the 'law of god'.
And there are certain christian wings that either used to adhere or still do adhere to that biblical stipulation.
But many christian forgot all about it though.
But even when not religious it's a freaking asshole thing to do and unlawful to boot, and there is the question why they would remove organs and bones and then destroy them, from workers in nuclear facilities.. you do the math.
Re:UK gov "sorry" = UK gov "we got caught" (Score:4, Informative)
Let me correct that for you: "gov "sorry" = gov "we got caught".
Wherever you are, the government is only sorry when it gets caught. If it is cheaper or has some other benefit and doesn't get caught then they don't care. Such is the way of politics.
Research on the effects of long term exposure (Score:5, Informative)
The summary makes us think that "Many of the organs taken were removed without any apparent forensic purpose in mind."; In fact, "The organs were examined at Sellafield as part of research into the health effects of work in the industry"
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
I've lived there (Score:3, Informative)
Is your friend an undergraduate or graduate student? I'd lay a small wager that it is the former in your case.
The undergraduate degree I read over a decade ago (BA in Computation - anywhere else this would be a BSc in Computer Science) was indeed a very mediocre course (and there were only two lecturers that were any good, though most of my tutors - those who conducted tutorials consisting of two students at a time - were very good); but to be perfectly honest most undergraduate programmes in CS in existence are rather mediocre (I can't speak for other disciplines).
The key thing is the quality of research undertaken in the University - this is certainly world-class in most disciplines (which impacts those reading higher degrees by research). This probably won't impact you much if you were reading an undergraduate degree, though.
I can't agree that the "majority of students who go there are considered 'mediocre'," though. The vast majority of people I knew (which is significantly more than your one friend) were intelligent and articulate. This is what tends to happen when you have a selection system which requires applicants to hold extremely high academic grades (three A grades at UK A-level, or if you are from the US a score of 2,100/2,400 in the SAT reasoning test or an ACT score of 32/36), and then go through an interview-based selection.