BRITONS reacted with horror a year ago when a government report revealed the
full extent of the scandal at Alder Hey hospital in Liverpool. The organs of
hundreds of dead children, supposedly taken for medical research, were found
forgotten in the hospital basement. Many had been taken without the knowledge of
the children鈥檚 parents, leaving them feeling betrayed.
The government reacted by overhauling the process doctors must follow to carry
out post-mortems. But the climate of mistrust after Alder Hey has created a new crisis
(see 鈥淐risis of confidence鈥�).
Medical staff are approaching fewer and fewer grieving
relatives to perform autopsies and relatives are more reluctant to agree. If we
don鈥檛 do enough post-mortems, pathologists fear, we could lose a vital method
for spotting new diseases. Without post-mortems, for example, we would not have
identified variant CJD and Legionnaire鈥檚 disease as quickly as we did.
The British government must launch an education campaign to tell people why
post-mortems are so important. Senior (not junior) doctors or, perhaps,
specially trained counsellors could back up the message in local hospitals. If
the case is put convincingly, the public will respond. A post-mortem on one
child could end up saving the life of another. Many parents whose children died
in Alder Hey now appreciate this reasoning. It鈥檚 just that no one explained it
at the time.
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