Two people – one a boy as young as 12 – have been smuggled into Britain to have their organs removed and sold on the black market.
The horrific cases, which have been revealed in an official report, show the lengths to which human traffickers will go to make money from their vile trade.
The pair were brought into the country last year by gangs seeking to exploit the worldwide demand for transplant organs.
One was identified as a.....
boy aged between 12 and 15 and the other as a woman in her 30s.
They are thought to have started their journey in Africa or Asia and to have been rescued by British police or immigration officials who suspected they were being trafficked.
Such cases are rare, but expose what charities and campaign groups suspect is a little-known aspect of international people-smuggling.
The first incident of illegal ‘organ harvesting’ in Britain was reported in 2011.
Two years later a girl was brought from Somalia with the intention of removing her organs and selling them on to patients desperate for a transplant.
The two latest cases are revealed in a report by the National Crime Agency, which was set up by the Government to combat serious and organised crime.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), as many as 7,000 kidneys are illegally obtained by gangs each year around the world.
While there is a black market for hearts, lungs and livers, kidneys are the most sought-after organs because one can be removed from a patient without serious ill-effects.
The conspiracy involves a number of people, including a recruiter who identifies the victim, someone else to organise their journey, medical professionals to perform the operation and an accomplice charged with offering the organ for sale.
While the vast majority of trafficking cases highlighted in the NCA statistics relate to sexual exploitation and modern-day slavery, ‘organ harvesting’ is specifically identified as a category of cross-border criminal activity.
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