This week, the Dutch TV company responsible for the ‘Win a Kidney’ reality show being widely criticized around the world, has admitted it was all a hoax. Endemol, the Dutch creator of Big Brother has been promoting the fake show for the last few weeks, offering one lucky ‘winner’ a 1 in 3 chance of receiving a life-saving organ from a 37 year old terminally ill woman.
The truth is that the woman in question is not a patient but an actor, and the only thing that is terminal is the station boss’s sense of humour. The letter pages of the world’s press have been running hot with angry scribes protesting against the show claiming it trivialized a life and death situation, while even the Dutch Prime Minister weighed in, describing the program as unethical.
Endemol rejected the charge, stating that the company was not trying to make light of the issue, they just thought it would highlight the obstacles involved in finding suitable organs, while also being a good old hoot.
Laugh? I thought my dialysis machine would never dry.
