Daily Times

In 1968, Bruce Tucker went into a research hospital in the US state of Virginia with a head injury, only to have his heart taken out of his body and put into the chest of a businessman. Now, in The Organ Thieves, Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist Chip Jones exposes the horrifying inequality surrounding Tucker’s death and how he was used as a human guinea pig without his family’s permission or knowledge, says a review in goodreads.com. “The circumstances surrounding his death reflect the long legacy of mistreating African Americans that began more than a century before with cadaver harvesting and worse. It culminated in efforts to win the heart transplant race in the late 1960s,” the review added. It said The Organ Thieves “has broad appeal. Everyone from medical students to senior professors and laymen alike will enjoy this work.” Students of history, ethics, research fellows or anyone who wants to know more about the early history of heart transplants in the US “will find this book invaluable,” added the review.