August 9th 2024.
Every year in China, an estimated 60,000 to 100,000 organ transplants are performed. Unfortunately, many of these transplants are not from willing donors, but from prisoners who are subjected to the inhumane practice of organ harvesting. Cheng Pei Ming is one of these victims, but what sets him apart is that he survived to share his story of the abuse he suffered at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party.
Cheng, who hails from the Guozhuang Village in Shandong Province, was arrested in 1999 for practicing Falun Gong, a spiritual practice that is considered a cult by the Chinese government, but is widely practiced in the West. He was sentenced to eight years in prison for advocating against the persecution of Falun Gong and was imprisoned at Harbin Prison. During his time there, he was forced to undergo blood tests three times in one year, a common practice used to determine the health of transplantable organs.
In 2002, Cheng was transferred to another prison where he endured hours of torture, including the infamous "big stretch" method where his limbs were tied up and pulled in all directions. During this time, officials from the 610 Office, China's secret police, attempted to coerce Cheng into consenting to an organ harvesting operation. When he refused, he was injected with a sedative and lost consciousness.
When he awoke in November 2004, Cheng found himself shackled to a hospital bed with an IV tube in his foot, a drainage tube in his chest, and oxygen tubes in his nose. He also had a 35 cm incision on his chest. Present-day medical scans have confirmed that parts of his liver and lung were missing, likely due to organ extraction. Cheng was subjected to years of torture by prison guards before finally escaping and evading Chinese authorities for 14 years.
It is estimated that China's organ trade has a market value of $1 billion per year, leading to a significant investment in hospitals, medical personnel, and infrastructure. This industry saw a significant increase in 2000, coinciding with the persecution of Falun Gong, as vital organs became readily available for transplant operations within a matter of days. State-run hospitals and websites began advertising incredibly short wait times for organs, something that no other country has been able to achieve.
Experts believe that Chinese surgeons were also harvesting tissue for pediatric liver transplants and performing unethical medical experiments on prisoners like Cheng. Despite suffering years of torture, Cheng continued to resist the forced organ harvesting and even managed to escape from the hospital before the operation could be performed. After five years in Thailand, where he was granted refugee status by the UN, Cheng was able to reach the US in July 2020.
International human rights lawyer David Matas commented on Cheng's case, saying that while he is a typical victim of China's forced organ harvesting, he is also unusual in that he survived and escaped both the Chinese authorities and China itself. Cheng's story sheds light on the dark reality of China's organ harvesting industry, and it is crucial that we continue to raise awareness and take action against this inhumane practice.
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