The consequences of Orthodox-inspired laws which have left Israeli hospitals woefully short of human skin for emergency burn transplants were dramatized this week by the 14 soldiers who survived Sunday’s suicide truck-bomb attack in south Lebanon with severe burns covering large areas of their bodies.
Urgently in need of transplants, it was discovered that the skin banks in Israel’s major hospitals were literally bankrupt. Doctors appealed to colleagues in Holland for human skin, which is being flown to Israel.
Many Israelis volunteered to donate skin when the shortage became known. But doctors said the burnt areas were too large — in some of the soldiers 80 percent of the body surface — to be covered by skin from living donors.
According to the doctors, the human adult has about two square meters of skin surface and in many cases up to a square meter of skin is required to cover burn areas, to prevent sepsis and to speed the body’s production of new skin.
LAW CREATED PROBLEM
The situation was created by the anatomy and pathology laws passed by the Knesset over a year ago under heavy pressure from the religious parties. The medical profession protested in vain. The laws, which have been rigidly applied, bar the removal of organs or skin from a deceased person unless permission was given before death or consent obtained from next of kin after death. Recovered organs may be used only for direct person-to-person transplants. The law forbids storage of organs or skin for use in general emergencies.
The tragedy in Lebanon and the plight of the surviving soldiers has aroused public opinion. Voices have been raised on the political left to have the pathology laws repealed or amended. One religious politician, Zevulun Hammer of the National Religious Party, urged the Chief Rabbinate to review the matter on grounds of “pikuah nefesh” (danger to life).
The Chief Rabbis called a meeting of rabbinical authorities and doctors to draft new regulations for skin transplants in emergencies. The Sephardic Chief Rabbi, Mordechai Eliahu, refused to wait. He ordered the Burial Society to allow skin to be removed from bodies before burial because of the emergency, regardless of whether or not relatives consent.
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