Here is another example of how the system can fail those it was intended to serve.

ABC News reported July 24 that a Maryland man had died from rabies after receiving a kidney from an infected donor. Citing a report on the occurrence from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ABC News said the Maryland patient was the eighth known victim who had received a rabies tainted solid organ transplant:

The man, whose name and age have not been released, developed brain inflammation known as encephalitis in February, 17 months after the transplant, according to the report published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association. He died 26 days later.

At the time of the transplant, the organ donor was brain dead from what doctors thought was ciguatera, a form of food poisoning caused by contaminated fish. That he had recently been bitten by two raccoons, the most frequently reported rabid animal in the United States, went unreported until after the transplant, according to the report.