Fury at kidney-swop TV

Patients waiting for transplant organs have condemned a Dutch TV reality show in which a dying woman will choose a patient to receive one of her kidneys.

The National Kidney Federation spoke out as broadcaster BNN vowed to go ahead with the controversial live show this Friday despite efforts by Dutch MPs to ban it.

Behind the scenes, the board of the private TV company was under massive pressure to drop the show which MPs said was damaging Holland's international reputation.

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Today as plans are unveiled in Brussels to improve the organ-donor network across Europe, TV producers from Endemol, the company behind the Big Brother reality shows, are putting the finishing touches to The Big Donor Show.

Ray Mackey, 43, co-chairman of the UK National Kidney Federation, who received a kidney transplant two years ago, said the concept of the show was "totally abhorrent".

"It just seems that it is totally the shock factor that they are going for," he said.

Three contestants between 18 and 40, armed with professionally made movies about their lives, loves and aspirations, will compete to win the approval of a 37-year-old woman with an inoperable brain tumour who has been told she will die before the end of the year.

With the help of viewer votes, the woman, known only as Lisa, will decide which contestant deserves her kidney.

Mr Mackey said Endemol had not taken into account the huge psychological blow the two losers would have to deal with.

"To go through that traumatic thing on the television, it just doesn't bear thinking about," he added.

Timothy Statham, the federation's chief executive, said the show was a travesty that threatened the organ transplants system, which depended on acts of altruism.

Professor John Feehally, who has just ended his term as president of Britain's Renal Association, said: "The scenario portrayed in this programme is ethically totally unacceptable.

"The show will not further understanding of transplants.

"Instead it will cause confusion and anxiety."

BNN TV, which is based at Hilversum near Amsterdam, appears to be basking in the worldwide publicity.

It claims it is provoking debate on an important issue, and says the programme is partly "in tribute" to the station's founder who died of kidney failure.

"We know that this programme is super controversial and some people will think it's tasteless, but we think the reality is even more shocking and tasteless: waiting for an organ is just like playing the lottery," Laurens Drillich, chairman of the BNN network, said.

With the massive publicity generated, the Big Donor Show could become one of the most watched TV programmes ever.

The show is planned as a one-off, but Dutch TV industry sources speculated that if viewing figures made it a success, there would be little to stop it acting as a pilot for a series of similar "give me a transplant" type shows.

The identities of the donor and would-be recipients are to be revealed when the 80-minute show starts at 8.30pm on Friday.

Viewers will be urged to text in their votes, and Lisa will consider their verdict before making the decision on her own about who gets her organs.

BNN has the potential to make hundreds of thousands of pounds in profits on the text messages alone.

The broadcaster has brought entertainment to new lows in Holland, with another of its programmes showing drug taking, live sex acts and women testing sex toys.

Joop Atsma, an MP with the ruling CDA party, met education minister Ronald Plasterk in an attempt to have the show stopped.

"I want to block this. This is truly not permissible," Mr Atsma said.

"It would be a victory for decency and common sense if this were not screened."

But Mr Plasterk told the Dutch parliament that the constitution forbade him from declaring an outright ban on the show.

a spokesman for Endemol in Britain said that, although there was no legal bar to presenting such a programme here, the company had no plans to do so.