I came across this article which talks about an issue which is plaguing our nation for past few years - Kidney Transplants. It has become a big business these days with thousands of rupees changing hands in every sale of this precious organ. This article sheds some light about the practices in others countries and what needs to be done to make this organ transplant safer and better in India. Read on...

Author: Maitreesh Ghatak
Posted online at financialexpress.com

Let us assume for the purposes of our discussion that surgical procedures do not entail much risk. Would it be alright then to legalise the kidney trade? To answer this question as well as understand land transactions better, consider the example of heart transplants. Medical technology has made them possible, but the replaced heart comes from the body of a just-deceased person who had pledged beforehand to posthumously donate the organ. Should trading in human hearts be legalised, assuming that healthcare standards are high and there is no use of force or coercion? It is one thing if a dying man allows, in exchange for an agreed-upon sum, his heart to be taken out after his death and given to another person. But what if a healthy but impoverished individual, of his own free will, agrees to be killed and have his heart extracted for transplantation so that the money from the sale can help his family? No legal system in the world would find this acceptable, and with good reason.

It is well known that trading in hair, blood, sperm and eggs is legal in most countries, primarily because the human body can naturally replenish these. This is not the case with the heart and the kidneys, though the body can function quite well with one kidney instead of two. So, in thinking about whether to legalise kidney trade—or, for that matter any other trade that poses serious health risks on the participants—our judgement depends on the extent of these risks. Even the most aggressive advocate of free markets would agree that somewhere between the hair, where the risk is zero, and the heart, where death is certain, there needs to be a line demarcating the limits of the right to buy and sell.

In countries where government regulation is lax and healthcare for the masses is not up to the mark, this line needs to be drawn more conservatively. However, it would be naïve to think that imposing a legal ban puts an end to a troubling practice. There is a thriving black market for kidneys in India, and like all such markets, the biggest gain from it goes to the middlemen. Their presence ensures that sellers get only a fraction of the price paid by the buyers, and the latter are often duped too. And since everything happens outside the ambit of the law, corrupt doctors flout healthcare norms at will. Stories of organ rackets and scams abound in our newspapers. Many feel that legalising the transaction and imposing regulations on the organ market will help matters. While Iran is hardly the best example of a free market economy, it was motivated by similar sentiments in legalising the kidney trade in 1988. As a result, it is the only country where the demand for human kidneys is met with adequate supply.

It must be mentioned that in Iran, kidneys are not bought and sold in the open market, but only within a network created by the government and charitable medical institutions. But as noted earlier, the surgical removal of the organ has been problematic in Iran, and many sellers have ended up regretting their decision. Therefore, one feels somewhat hesitant to laud the fact that in this market demand is being met with supply.

Where a black market exists, such as India, potential sellers are deterred by the fear of being exploited by middlemen, of health risks, and of getting caught. Consequently, supply is always less than demand. Legalising the transaction could potentially reduce malpractices and health risks and ensure a better price to the seller. This is likely to push up the supply considerably in poor countries. However, increased supply will reduce the price. More importantly, unless the poor are provided adequate legal and medical safeguards, now a much larger segment of the population would be exposed to exploitation and health risks. As a result, it is not clear that legalising the sale of kidneys would lead to an increase in overall welfare compared to the earlier situation where a much smaller section of the population was involved in such transactions.

What about donations? The transaction is the same as in sales, with the same health risks and consequences. The difference is that one of the transactions is commercial, while the other is voluntary. There are no financial transactions involved in donations, and this automatically minimises the problems of quality control and malpractice. Health-related risks are similar for both, but the presence of middlemen and traders increases these risks considerably in the case of commercial transactions relative to donations. So, the arguments against legalisation mentioned earlier remain.

But society does have to pay a price for this kind of regulation. The biggest one in this context is the high probability of mismatch between donor and receiver organs. It is possible to start a system of exchange between all donors and receivers. The recent amendments to India’s 15 year law on organ transplants aim to facilitate this. But it is not difficult to gauge the limitations of such a system. The monetary system, after all, was invented because the barter system is subject to the problems of double coincidence of wants and coordination.

The recent amendments also aim to make it easier for the organ to be sourced from just-deceased or brain-dead individuals. In India about 1,00,000 people suffer from renal failure every year and about 80,000 people die of accidents. This suggests cadaveric donations could be an important source of organs. This is not as easy as it sounds, because donor and receiver kidneys need to match, and also, delays can make the organ unfit for transplants. In addition, there are social norms that go against putting a dead man under the scalpel.

In some countries of continental Europe, cadaveric organ procurement is based on the principle of presumed consent as opposed to informed consent as in the US and the UK. Under presumed consent, a deceased individual is classified as a potential donor unless he or she explicitly opts out before death.

Under informed consent, this is the case only if they volunteer, i.e., opt-in. Evidence provided by economists Abadie and Gay (2006)* suggests that the former increases availability significantly (see figure). Given the salience of the anti-legalisation arguments in countries like India, this seems to be a worthwhile direction to explore.

20Century Fox

Avatar, the movie which has made headlines all over the globe, movie which has given another avatar to the Hollywood movie industry during this recession, and a movie which is the topic of many house hold dinning table talks. It has broken many records and making history in the world movie industry.

Before I talk about the main interest, here are some titbit's you might be interested if you are not aware of them.

1. Producers spent around $300 in production cost and more for marketing.

2. It already raked up 1 Billion from all over world in just 2.4 weeks. According to Box Office Mojo it’s current box office total stands at $$1,018,811,000  million.

3. Opening Weekend:  $77,025,481
(#1 rank, 3,452 theaters, $22,313 average)
% of Total Gross:  21.9%  
Widest Release:  3,461 theaters 
In Release:  17 days / 2.4 weeks 
 

A movie which cannot stop making money and surely a movie to watch. After hearing  rave reviews and commentaries,especially setting itself apart from ther sequels like Lord of the Rings with Sanskrit title, I was intrigued to see it. I finally watched the movie yesterday and it surely didn't fail to surprise with spectacular animation,  special effects and astonishing camera. I was totally blown away by the Himalayan effort put forth to bring this movie as a sensational entertainer with a great message for this time.

James Cameron proved himself again as the Best Director of all time by giving back to back hits. But, as an person born and bought from India, I felt that the story is old and many of my Indian friends agreed with me. I have seen similar kinda of movies when I was a kid in the Indian cinema with little special effects available at that time frame. Those movies had stories where person transfers from body to body too. I am talking about 20-30 years back. Except the special effects, graphics and animation, I  see the old story line in many aspects but with new scientific proofs which makes it believable. It has lot of connection and adaptation from Veda's(Sanskrit literature) and many other Indian literatures. Even the character visualization and makeup's can be related to many ancient Indian traditions and especially the body color can be related to Lord Krishna avatar deplicted below in the picture.

Being said all that, James Cameron not only just gave new look to the old story but a brand new planet creating a new paradigm for the many more avatars to come. As money examiner, I would say it surely money maker but do have couple of questions.

What was James Cameroon thinking?  While the nation is just recovering from recession, 300 million dollar spent in making a movie, doesn't really makes sense? At the same time, it is giving people totally new experience in a new world and also bringing them to theaters to spend money during the holiday season helping the economy.

Share your thoughts about Avatar and money spent in making the money. Is it worth spending this much money or waste?

With great recessions or depression comes great opportunity to invest and expand for both individuals and businesses. You are already witnessing lot of mergers, take overs and many old companies entirely vanishing from the earth. 

Thats true all over the world and especially many Indian companies taking this opporunity to expand their reach in bigger markets. The trend has gone little more far. Days of American companies coming to India for outsourcing are gone. Now many Indian companies are setting stones in US and UK to service their foreign clients.

TATA's who acquired Jaquar and Land Roover from FORD is one good example. It is planning to launch NANO cars using their dealership network in US. That is change of business model.  Don't wait for business to come to you, go where the business is. In IT servicing industry, this new approach is catching fire and taking many dimensions by Indian IT providers like HCL, Infosys and Wipro. 


I read an article published in PC world 2 months ago and like to share some essence of the article. Indian outsourcers are increasingly looking to put data and software development centers closer to customers, including opening ones in the U.S. Some outsourcers also believe that hiring local staff reduces criticism in the U.S. that Indian outsourcers are causing job losses in the U.S.

Indian outsourcer HCL Technologies has acquired its first data center in the U.S. from one of its customers, the company said on Monday.

HCL also took over the data center's staff and other operations, said R. Srikrishna, senior vice president for sales for the North America business of HCL's Infrastructure Services Division. The data center, located in New Jersey, fits into HCL's strategy to offer some services from locations close to its customers, Srikrishna said. The data center will in part be used to serve the unnamed customer HCL purchased it from, as well as offer services to other HCL clients.

HCL has already invested US$15 million to upgrade the 35,000-square-foot center to support eco-friendly technologies, virtualization, cloud computing, business continuity and mainframe management services. Customers want data center services delivered from locations close to them, he said. A customer in California, for example, would prefer to have services delivered from a data center in the state rather than from New Jersey, he added.

Although customers can save money by outsourcing IT services to India, this may not be the case with data centers, according to Srikrishna.

Setting up and running a data center in the U.S. is far cheaper because of India's high electricity costs, Srikrishna said. Real estate -- the other major cost for a data center -- is on par and in some cases cheaper in the U.S. than in India, he added.

HCL already has close to 5,000 staff in the U.S., and this is likely to grow, Srikrishna said. About 1,500 of the staff became part of the company after its acquisition last year of Axon Group, a SAP consulting company firm in the U.K.  A large number of outsourcing contracts, particularly infrastructure services contracts, have required HCL to absorb some of the clients' IT staff.

This change is also happening in banking sector. SBI India has opened branches in DC, Newyork and Chicago to act as US bank with Indian foot hold to attract NRI's investment. It is a good change and welcome one.

What do you think about this change? Share your comments and thoughts.

GOLD, the love for the glittering yellow metal has peaked in recent months and it is eyeing to reach previous highest mark of $1033.80 in March 2008. After moving sideways for the last six months, Gold price crossed the $1,000 mark for an ounce once again and strongly moving forward.

There are many factors cited as reasons – relating to economics, psychology, mathematical and of course, currency(inflation).

However, does this thousand dollar crossing mean something more? Or, is it a short-term speculation rather than a longer term trend? Also why it always happens in September? And given this situation, Can I buy some gold before moves up to add in my portfolio or wait to go down, are the critical question.

Why Gold always goes up in September?

Gold cannot escape the viscious economic cycle of supply and demand. When there is increased demand with less/normal supply, any commodity price tends to go up.

September has been the best time to buy gold in terms of its month-on-month price appreciation over the past four decades, according to Frank Holmes, CEO and CIO at US Global Investors. Statistical data from 1969 till today do not show otherwise, and so this time round ironically, gold comes into the limelight at a time it’s always been sought.

September is one of the most important months for gold due to various occurrences around the planet. Firstly, the post-monsoon wedding season in India and Diwali, one of the country's most important festivals lead to a major increase in gold demand. Gold is restocked by jewellery makers who are preparing in advance, for the Christmas shopping season in the United States.

The holy month of Ramadan, which comes to an end by late September this year and is subsequently followed by Eid, sees a tradition of exchanging gifts on a large scale as a mark of celebration all over. Similarly, in China, the week-long National Day celebration starting from October 1 and the lead-up from then on till the Chinese new year, always fuel gold demand in China as well.

Another most consistent correlations for gold and the most commonly accepted fact is its inverse relationship with the US dollar. When gold is up, the dollar tends to be down, and vice versa. As per data going back 20 years, this relationship occurs nearly 70% of the time and September is one of the dollars favourite months to be down. Out of 39 Septembers going back to 1970, the dollar has seen negative performance 26 times, which is more than any other month of the year.

What to look out?

While reports and opinions are pointing towards the dollar weakening and gold strengthening, certain undeniable facts do lend them credibility as well. The fact that the US fiscal deficit is expected to be a record $1.6 trillion, and the White House projected last month that the deficit will grow another $9 trillion between 2010 and 2019.

These huge deficits will fan inflation fears and keep downward pressure on the dollar. This coupled with the fact that the Federal Reserve's massive stimulus spending and the likely –hood that a low interest rate scenario will be prevalent for a few mote months, only further weakens the dollar position and strengthens gold’s.

Will be continued in next week blog post...

Sources - financialexpress.com