My Sister's Keeper Ethical Issues

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When Sara and Brian Fitzgerald found out their eldest daughter, Kate, had acute promyelocytic leukemia they were devastated, as most parents would be. They vowed to do anything and everything to help their daughter survive cancer. When the issue came to who could donate to Kate, they found out no one in the family was a match. Running out of options, they decided to listen to their doctor when he mentioned off the record that having another child specially made so that she could donate to Kate was an option; a savor baby. A savor baby is a child that is born to help heal an already existing sick child. Sara and Brian jumped on the idea without a second thought as to how this would affect their soon-to-be-child, Anna. Although their intentions …show more content…

This ties into Anna's self-esteem. She is not viewed as a whole person, but as a collection of spare parts to be given away. When she goes to Campbell's office she tells him "I wouldn't even be alive if it wasn't for Kate being sick" (Picoult, 22). She knows that she was not born to be an individual but as an extension of Kate. In My Sister’s Keeper Anna was never asked if she wanted to perform any of these donations. They only assumed she did because that is the reason she was born. Brian wanted the first blood cell transfusion from the umbilical cord to be the only transplant Anna would have to go through. When Kate started getting sick again, Sara assumed it would be okay to use Anna again. Brian was hesitant to keep using Anna as a donor because he did not want his other child to feel used. Although Brian wanted to have a say in his own parenting, Sara pushed him to have Anna keep donating. She believed that she had to do everything in her power to keep Kate alive. As long as none of these procedures were harming Anna in the long term, they were worth it to keep her child alive. Finally, Anna had enough. Anna wanted to live her own life, play hockey, and travel. As a spare parts baby, after donating her kidney, she would not be able to do any of these things. She was never asked for permission to do all these tests; it was just assumed that she would do them because her sister needed them, …show more content…

If Kate dies, Anna will feel like she failed. From the very moment Anna was born, she not only had to worry about her life, but the life of her sister. As stated in the second paragraph, Anna knows that once Kate dies her life will not have a purpose. For her to be useful she has to keep Kate alive. That is a big responsibility for a thirteen-year-old girl. She wants to be able to play hockey and travel the world, yet she is stuck going wherever her sister goes, as it is her job to keep her alive. Anna was accepted into a prestigious hockey camp but was not allowed to attend, as they might have needed her to help Kate. She does not get to live her own life because she is taking care of someone else’s. If Anna ever wants to go anywhere on her own for an extended period she would have to risk Kate dying. This is not a responsibility anybody should have and forcing it on a thirteen-year-old girl is irresponsible as a

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