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Senior Member
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Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 22,503
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Senior Member
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 22,503
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Outrage At \'Big Brother\' Kidney Show and World falls for Endemol hoax (merged)
From Sky News
A reality game show by the makers of Big Brother will this week see a terminally ill woman select a recipient for her kidneys.
The programme, to be shown in the Netherlands on Friday, has caused outrage among health campaigners and politicians.
They say The Big Donor Show, made by Dutch company Endemol, represents a new low in reality TV and should not be shown.
However, the makers have defended the show, saying it is meant to highlight the difficulty of obtaining a kidney donor.
It is the latest row over reality shows. Channel 4 has been rapped by the broadcasting watchdog Ofcom over the racist bullying in the last series of Celebrity Big Brother.
Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf said The Big Donor Show, on channel BNN, would see a dying 37-year-old woman - identified only as Lisa - choose from three people with kidney problems.
She will make her choice based on the contestants' history, profile and conversations with their families and friends.
Viewers will be able to send text messages advising her during the 80-minute show.
BNN chairman Laurens Drillich said: "The chance for a kidney for the contestants is 33%.
Show to be debated in Dutch parliament"This is much higher than that for people on a waiting list. You would expect it to be better but it is worse."
Reiner Hofmann, spokesman for the Dutch Transplant Foundation, said the show was "a scandal".
He told The Sun newspaper: "It is no better than selling organs - they are taking advantage of people in a desperate situation for entertainment."
Members of the ruling coalition parties the Christian Democrats and the conservative Christian Union have called the show "wretched" and unethical. The programme is set to be debated in the Dutch parliament this week.
BNN says it wants to highlight the difficulties faced by kidney sufferers in getting donor organs as a tribute to BNN founder Bart de Graaff, who died of kidney failure five years ago, despite several transplants.
The show is reportedly the idea of Endemol founder John de Mol.
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