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What Recovery? Record Number Of Americans Become Blood Plasma "Sellers" To Make Ends Meet
Having previously explained President Obama's recovery in charts, we thought words and pictures would be a better indicator of the dire situation facing so many Americans that get missed by the business media's spotlight. With 9.4 million more Americans below the poverty line than before the crisis, as The LA Times reports, it's disturbing to see so many people so destitute - even if they're working - that they've resorted to selling body fluids to make ends meet. The going rate for plasma donation, which can take a couple of hours, is about $25 or $30. But Octapharma is offering $50 for the first five visits, "when you get that $50, you feel good," one plasma 'seller' said, "I paid my gas bill."
Despite the Fed continuing to kick this down the road, they continue to claim that we are in the middle of an ongoing recovery. There’s just one problem with that: things are getting worse than pre-crisis levels for millions of the poorest Americans.
But it gets worse, as 1000s of unemployed (and under-employed) Americans resort to selling their blood plasma to make ends meet (as The LA Times reports)
"The line was too long," a middle-aged woman named Joyce Rogers said as she got into her car outside Octapharma Plasma in Van Nuys.
Rogers, a certified nurse assistant, told me she was going to a job interview and would return later to see if the line had thinned. But it seldom seems to. I've seen dozens of people reclined on lounges, fat 17-gauge needles in their arms, while dozens more wait in the packed lobby and the parking lot, some of them with children in tow.
The going rate for plasma donation, which can take a couple of hours, is about $25 or $30. But Octapharma is offering $50 for the first five visits, and a poster in the lobby says: "Donate 10X by the end of October for a chance to win a TV!!!"
"When you get that $50, you feel good," Rogers said. "I paid my gas bill."
At the same center, three veterans sat in a skunky-smelling car in the parking lot and told me they pay a different kind of bill with their plasma money.
"Medical marijuana," said one of the three. "It helps with my anxiety."
Whatever the motive of the sellers, the plasma business is a booming, $20-billion-dollar international enterprise, according to Patrick Robert, an industry analyst. Demand for plasma is growing worldwide, he said, because the body fluid is used to manufacture drugs that treat immune disorders, protein disorders, shock, severe burns and other maladies, with business expanding into developing countries.
Octapharma and Biomat USA are each a division of a European-based pharmaceutical company, but the vast majority of the world's plasma providers are in the United States, where screening and handling regulations are considered safe, and selling fluids is more culturally acceptable.
"We have all kinds of donors, under-employed or unemployed," said Vlasta Hakes, spokeswoman for Grifols, the Spanish company that owns Biomat USA.
She said Grifols has 150 plasma centers in the U.S., with five in California including huge, sleek facilities in Bellflower and Lake Balboa. On average, 1,000 people sell plasma weekly at each center.
Like other industry reps, Hakes refers to plasma "donors" rather than plasma sellers, which may sound a little better from a marketing perspective. She emphasizes the great benefit of plasma-based drugs.
But it's disturbing to see so many people so destitute — even if they're working — that they've resorted to selling body fluids. For their trouble, they make something akin to minimum wage while billions of dollars flow into corporate bank accounts.
Dr. Roger Kobayashi, a Nebraska physician who teaches immunology at UCLA, takes it a step further. He raises moral and ethical questions about the commodification of a body fluid by international businesses that sometimes behave in ways that hurt patients.
"Prices keep going up, and it's becoming harder to get the drugs to patients because they can't afford it," Kobayashi said. "The people who are making a lot of money are the investors and the corporations."
And they are well aware that for many people living on the edge, personal economics is all that matters.
"This is my first time," a middle-aged woman named Elizabeth told me at the Lake Balboa Biomat USA. She said she took time off from a job to care for her ailing mother, and now she can't find work.
"If you would have told me five years ago that I'd end up in here, I wouldn't have believed it. It's reality, and it's humbled me for sure."
At the Orange Biomat, Navy veteran Tim Edwards told me he makes about $13.50 an hour setting up alcohol displays in stores, and he was waiting to hear if he got a better job he'd applied for.
"I can't pay my debts," he said. "I have mixed feelings because I don't want to have to do this. At the same time, it feels good to be doing something positive for other people."
However in The Land Of The Free, there are numerous other bodily fluids one can produce and exchange for cash... (as wisebread.com reports)
1. Sperm
For a young guy who lacks money, sperm donation can seem like the ultimate gig. It pays well, and the process involved is, um, pretty familiar. (The vast majority of donors are college students.)
What It Involves
Sperm donation kind of seems like getting cash for something you may (or may not, no judgments…) be doing anyway, but it's a lot more complicated than that. You have to be tall (at least 5'10" or taller, depending on the sperm bank.) You have to be smart… or at least be enrolled in college. You have to be between the ages of 18 and 35. In terms of of your chances, most donors are caucasian (most recipients are white couples), of a healthy weight, and not redheads.
If you fit the bill, you'll still have to sit through a job-interview-style round of questions about you, your life, and your future goals. This will be followed by a battery of health questions, including ultra-personal ones about your health status, your sex life, and your sexual partners. Even if you make it through this gauntlet of challenges, you'll have to hand over your first two donations free of charge, so that your little swimmers can be tested.
The Payout
Sperm banks set their own rates, but payouts range from $30 to $200 per, um, donation. However, if you're accepted as a donor, you'll often have to sign a contract to donate weekly over a long period of time — like six months to a year — during which time your checks may be held in escrow until your term is up. The money might be good, but it isn't fast and it isn't as easy as it sounds.
2. Eggs
I really don't know if eggs are a liquid or not. What I do know is that they are donated to people who are unable to conceive, and they provide a very high payout compared to most other fluids. So, let's just assume they come in liquid form and roll with it, okay?
What It Involves
Donating eggs is no picnic. In fact, just getting to the actual egg donation (and payment) stage takes time, energy, and some degree of physical discomfort. First, donors have to fill out a questionnaire. If that's accepted, they will be asked to come in for a physical exam, psychological testing, blood tests, and a genetic screening. If you're approved as a donor, you'll have to wait at least a month to donate.
Next comes the donation cycle, and that's no picnic either. You will be injected with fertility drugs to stimulate the development of a number of eggs. Over the next two weeks, you'll have to continue to inject yourself with hormones and make daily morning visits to the clinic so that they can adjust your dosage and check on your progress. After seven to 12 days of this carnival ride, you'll be ready to have your eggs retrieved. You'll be anesthetized, and the eggs will be removed with a syringe. The procedure isn't painful, but the hormonal changes make it physically demanding, and mild side effects like moodiness and fluid retention can last up to two weeks. There are also some very serious side effects (although they're rare) to consider with this procedure.
The Payout
Well, it's big — $6,000 to $10,000 per donation depending on the market, the desirability of your particular donation, and the donation center you choose. If you work full time, that'll be offset by some lost time at work and some serious hassles, not to mention potential health consequences. There are no firm rules on how many times women can donate, but most clinics ask that they only do so a few times because the long-term health risks of the procedure are unknown.
3. Breast Milk
If you're a new mother, you may be carrying the equivalent of liquid gold: breast milk. And because some moms have way too much, while others have very little (or none at all), a group of moms got the idea to share the love by donating or selling breast milk to those who can't produce their own.
What It Involves
Pumping your breast milk and shipping it, on ice, to people who need it. There are online services to facilitate this process, most prominently onlythebreast.com, the Craigslist of breast milk exchange. You could probably even post your own ad in your community.
The Payout
On breast milk exchanges, milk tends to sell for $1.50 to $3.00 per ounce. To put that in perspective, a baby needs between 13 and 42 ounces of milk per day, depending on his or her weight — at $3 an ounce, that's $39 to $126 a day. Yowza!
4. Urine
Why would someone want to buy your pee? Because those who are subject to drug tests — whether for work or sports or parole — may not be able to pass those tests with their own urine. And, where there's demand, there will be supply.
What It Involves
Producing, packaging, and shipping your pee to other people. If you're really enterprising, you could even make a business out of it. In the late 1990s, a South Carolina man produced 50 urine samples a day, selling more than 15,000 samples per year before the state shut him down. Several other states have since passed similar laws.
The Payout
The going rate appears to be about $20 per ounce — and possibly jail time.
Whether it's a tiny condo in a bad part of town or a bag of someone else's urine, if there's enough demand for something, it will become valuable. Why do people sell bodily fluids for money? Simple answer: Because they can. That's just the way economies work.
* * *
And finally, if this is the 'recovery' just what will the next recession look like?
Charts: Bloomberg
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Next it will be kidneys
Ads are running already:
Sell kidney onlineThe cost of a human kidney is $70-80K and it could be enough to pay all your debts, credits and much more.
$70K is a lot of Eagles and Morgans.
Can I just get an iPhone for my kidney?
The going rate for an old iPhone is stripping nekked at a Russian bar.
it seems that average blackmarket seller of a Kidney gets around $5000 and buyer pays around $150,000. Trade is 100% legal in Iran
Don't they steal them in the Ukraine and export them to the people who provide medical services to ISIS wounded?
Wow, according to those charts we'll be at Full Soviet before Htlery takes office!!
I wonder is she'll wear a Mao Jacket or a Joe Stalin uniform?
>>>>Mao Jacket
>>>>Stalin Uniform
Long ago, I briefly served my fellow man as a sperm donor. The pay was pretty good, but I'd only recommend the experience for those who get off on smirking young women in nurses' uniforms.
Octopuspharma is saving the day.
About 25 years ago, there was a plasma 'donation' center near my school. I donated for 3 years through college! $30/week. Paid for my liesure time. Job paid for school and shit.
Blood money.
Blood Plasma futures market coming soon!
Courtesy of Goldman Sachs. ;-)
Looney
GS prefers that you donate eight pints at a time.
Looney.
Only a matter of time before The Squid is holding "slave", "servant" "debtor" auctions on Wall Street. Slave futures? What is the price of am Import? as oppposed to an already indoctrinated resident? slave? I would say that the unemployed, unhoused, indoctrinated step-and-fetch-it would command a premium. But then I will leave that to the Futures markets and the London Slave Set twice daily.
Before this game is through the population of the world will work for nothing to benefit the few.
Slaves from Africa were desired because they had no awareness of the land and wouldn't, as the natives did, pose runaway problems. Most of the "imports" have shown gerat willingness to be housed in cramped (and cheap) quarters. Non-imports are mostly older models in states of disrepair.
Tough call.
Went by Plasma shithole mid afternoon the other day.... PACKED parking lot.... must have been 200 cars.
Also- noticing closed thrift shops in several states in the east. Some closed up flea markets too- Feels like that part of the economy is screaming things are bad.
Those thrift shoppers are now strolling down the avenue, 5th Avenue.
It looks like that homeless guy I saw collecting used tampons is crazy like a fox.
Can we start a Plasma Futures Fund, and get GS to issue the IPO?
/s
The vampire squid and its blood funnel is way ahead of the game.
I stopped watching TV and Zollywood years ago but this reminds me of the Matrix or Aliens. The NWO/ZWO is this giant parasitic Matrix bleeding the sheeple to death.
does Berkey make a reverse osmosis plasma filter?,
who knows what's in the bloodstreams of people these days.....
This - is fucking sad. Only one step, a sensory deprivation tank and several umbilical connectors away from being totally part of the Matrix.
The Vampire Squid has triumphed.
Forward Bitchez!!
Welcome to the 3rd world.
Hey I sold plasma twice a week for 4 years while in college, it helped out just enough to make it worthwhile...I am just worried I may have to go back.
It paid for the beer and required fewer of 'em to get the job done.
I knew these mass shooting had an economic upside to some parties other than the gun companies.
We LITERALLY live in a William Gibson novel. I am just waiting for people to move into the bridge...
50$, wow It's tea and biscuits this side of the pond, if you're lucky a jammy dodger.
Used to donate regularly (every three weeks) at the Pheresis Centre, St George's Hospital. We got a LOT more than tea and biscuits - we had sandwiches, real orange juice - pretty well everything you could fancy, along with decent TV and really great staff. I was so impressed I even applied for a job with the NBTS (but didn't get it)!
They bulk processed (fractionated) on site, and the protein fractions were further refined by Blood Products up near Mill Hill.
VERY interesting work too, and I really enjoyed my days as a donor (got the Wedgewood plate too!)
....along with decent TV...
TV and Hollywood is for reatrds who enjoy being brainwashed.
Yea, I donated once and had to wait like 4 hrs to get 50 bucks. After the first few you get 35-40 dependin. Everyone there seemed to know they were being scammed, I guess they get a grand or two per sample and give you a small pittance. Most of the people there would openly say they are only there to pa for some weed. The whole vibe was that of a prison. Like the bulletproof windows and getting buzzed a pass thru a door...
They are also really strict with the samples they take. No iv drug users and you have a good diet. They called me and said I needed an extra process and testing because I ate something greasy ( a pizza the night before). I never went back, too many hoops to jump through.
Went to apply for a job at a plasma center (Im a nurse) . the place is in Tx. and lots of help wanted signs around,
but this place was packed 7 to 7 .
Lots of tatoos and IMHO sheeple working the system. Get all the beenies you (they can) and get their grimy $50 bucks
for whatever. They can do it , 2 times a week. $100 bucks buys lots of cigs and beer.
Overall nasty clients.
They do test the plasma as per strict fed. regs. But I dont know anything about strict diet.
Of course they are fed how they are saving lives and all that. Of course the owners are multi-millionaires and
they way the staff talks about the clients. Well, you can imagine.
There is a pre-screening process and dont take everyone.
How do you keep sane?
It's got to be like the Twilight Zone, or the Omega Man.
so whats the going rate for a handjob?
In 1990 I was one of thsoe guys, only a poor college student.
$30 per week for two donations. Worked out to $10 per hour. My cable technician job paid $4.50.
There is no inflation. repeat: there is no inflation
Back in the 80's it was $20. I never did it since I hate needles. Even though wages have not kept up, looks like donating plasma may have outpaced things a bit.
I find it hard to believe that this is for the benefit of TPTB. Really, there's no way in hell that their blood is red!
hey, day don' take EBT fo maddog, gots to gets the maddog somehow
I work near one and it is nearly always packed.
Is there an Apple store nearby? I really need to buy an AAPL share certifcate and iphone
And I thought it was aliens that would land and do mass harvesting. Looks like I might finally be wrong on something...
How much for OBongos blood? ALL OF IT? Theres gotta be a buyer somewherezzz
They should set up shop outside bingo games, fleece the poor two ways.
Fucking plasma joints. Crazy.
When they have to resort to selling body PARTS, then I might be concerned. Fluids, eggs, etc - not so much.
How about my poo? Can I get paid to ship my shit to you? Seriously I could make a lot more $ per hour by giving blow jobs in a parking lot. And I could resell the semen . . .
"Why so happy, Munchkins?"
"Hahahahaha, Reggie, I got Americans so bad off now they are selling blood for fuel and food! Meanwhile, I'm giving all the illegal aliens free housing, EBT, cars and voter registration- plus free healthcare! Hahahhaaha!"
"I love it when you are happy. C'mere, Munchkins, gimme a kiss!"
Life offers good choices and bad choices and those choices have consequences.
This is not about bubble gum. This is about corruption. As young as in my 20s, it was clear to me we were raping earth to make a fast buck. Food products were created at the expense of farm land. Over abundance brought to us by Get-Rich-Quick methods, bringing their man into political office and changing the laws to favor this rape and pillage of the entire planet. Just one hotel during dinner hour buffet, multipying that by a few hundred thousand of the same, 3 times a day, every day of the year for 50 years..and it is over. But they knew this. The so-called maestros of this calamity saw this coming and banked on it.
So fuck off. This has nothing to do with people. Media monopoly at an ungodly sum had a purpose and that was to DISTORT OUR REALITY while they fleeced, killed, and made certain by the time they were finished, there would be suffering so great, the concept of it cannot even be imagined.
Have any of you been hungry for a week without food? Do you understand what that does to one's mind? It leaves an imprint of such agony that being hungry again would be a worst fate than death itself.
Men in control are MENTALLY MAD, should be executed and of the tax dollars I and my family have added to this system, I say to the military. PROTECT ME YOU FUCKING BASTARDS.
"We" weren't raping the Earth, my friend. There is no "we"...you are entirely on your own and you can include me out.
I've been an environmentalist and a pacifist from before the first Earth Day in 1968. As for being poor, I've been there, too. I've dug ditches for my daily bread, slept on the floor in a roach-infested apartment, lived for *months* on one $3 meal per day. I've had no money, no car, no furniture, no food, no job, no nothing. But, you know what I never had? I never had the slightest notion that my life and circumstances were someone else's fault.
But they were. The kind of control over your own life that you are talking about is an illusion.
Corruption combined with mediocre leadership is a stake in the heart of a community. Environmentalist, well that is very admirable. In an attempt to paint myself as conscientious regarding our beautiful planet, I could say I have been printed in newspaper opinion at the age of 19. A well-received review of a book written on mining industry/factories byproducts entering our water ways (1976). This has been going on for a very long time.
You are out of control of your destiny whether you know it or not. Industry and poor management is of course the culprit. Antiquated system.
After a divorce, a marriage I had to leave due to colitis...very serious, had to have resection, and he was 2nd largest calf/cattle raiser in USA, I woke up one day and had no money. What I did finally do was go to the flea market and sell my Lladro for 10-15 dollars a piece, silver ware, sent cruise ware to assigment stores, had a garage sale and sold all my furniture, sold my jewels all but for the nicer pieces, and got a room mate...I am simply telling you, it was an all-consuming sensation, this hunger, and I was in a new town (had to get house right away as had a few dogs/cats).
But yea...
Well, no blood inflation anyway. We were gettng $25-35 for a jar in college in the 60's. Wonder if "retail" has ncreased a any?
"America's exceptional!"
"Yes we can!"
Lawyers should be banned from participating in govt.
"No Person who holds, or has held, a license to practice law; nor any person who has represented any entity (other than himself) in a court of law in these United States, may be elected to any public office.""Lawyers are amoral by definition and necessity, and as such should not be making the rules."
http://www.spectacle.org/797/gosta.html
who better to draft the law than lawyers?
Being a decent human being does not require law. Leaders should be scholars and gentlemen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AR8cSyL7WhU
There may be an upside. The blood recipients may recover.
I used to drive a friend to a clinic where she donated plasma. She invariably shit her pants on the way home.
And they get $11,000 for 40 grams of immune globulin. At least the supply should be up. I'd hate to run out.
They won't let me donate but once every 8 weeks. I get a $25 gift card for every 6 donations
Vampires!
At this rate there will be a glut blood products and body parts. But with the corrupt medical sysatem the way it is, the prices would still be unaffordable.
We have had people selling fluids long before this. I have read that many plasma related products end up in Europe due to mad cow or some related neurological outbreak there years ago. This renders the people of that part of the world unable to donate!
Would you rather these people break into your cars and home to steal from you to meet their drug needs? I had one of these centers open next to my business office and the clientele was shady looking to say the least. Let's just say none of them would be dating my grand daughter !
In Michigan growing up folks that looked like this picked apples in the orchards to buy their booze! I would be interested to find the percentage of those on food stamps and Medicaid! We have bill boards here in Mexican language with a smiling 11 year old beaner girl saying "get your braces with the card." Meaning free braces for your illegal immigrant criminal offspring. My kids braces cost me 3800 dollars after I paid income taxes!.
For those of you unaware what that means, that is called take home pay.
U want inside out bottom up zombies in the street ? Just turn off the EBT cards. I don't recognize my country! We have three beaner couples with a total of 9 children in one single family home behind mine. They suck the funds out of our school district and we teach them English as a second language cause we teach em Mexican and English.
If we white folk say anything it's Rayciss! Sho Nuff fucked! Nuff said
On the sperm donation: be careful. A friend did this and he later had a mental breakdown over it when he realized he was father to something like 20 different kids. He ended up agonizing over it for some time.
How did he feel when he found out one of his favorite lap dancers was one of his own? JK...I hope.
Look on the bright side. You'll all be able to tell your disbelieving grandkids about back when you could sell your blood before the vampire-run government imposed the blood tax and made contributions mandatory.