Need some new parts?

ORGAN TRAFFICKING

To further complicate the matter, Latin Americans also fall victim to the trafficking of organs. Today it is no longer rare to find corpses that have been plundered for their organs.

In Bucaramanga, in the northeastern Colombian province of Santander, the body of 17-year-old Johana Maritza Pinto was found bathed and dressed, without any blood on it, but with a sewed up wound that stretched from her neck to her belly button. "They took everything, from her lungs to her bladder," the police reported.

Others survive to tell the tale. An 18-year-old university student on his way to class in Bogota one morning struck up a conversation with two strangers on the bus. The last thing he remembers is that they sprayed something in his face. Five days later he woke up in a local park with a sewn-up wound in his side. He later discovered that he was missing a kidney, according to the Fundación Esperanza.

"We have heard of pregnant women whose babies have been stolen, or bodies of young people missing their corneas. But it is very difficult to document and follow up on such cases," said Diana Cano, national coordinator of Fundación Esperanza. http://www.ipsnews.org/news.asp?idnews=34438