SYDNEY, May 5: An Australian kidney specialist sparked a bitter medical ethics row on Monday by calling for organ sales to be legalised to stop patients travelling overseas to buy them on the black market.

Nephrologist Gavin Carney said Australia should allow the sale of organs, which currently carries a penalty of six months jail and a 4,400 dollar (4,092 US) fine, to help cut the bloated transplant waiting list.

Fit, young and healthy people should be allowed to peddle their kidneys for up to 50,000 dollars to save lives and money and to discourage needy patients from going to developing countries such as Pakistan and India to buy black-market organs for up to 30,000 dollars, he told the Sydney Morning Herald.

Australian kidney transplant patients currently wait for up to 10 years for a healthy organ.

But organ transplant groups slammed Carney’s controversial suggestion that Australia legalise a practice outlawed in most of the world, saying it would be open to abuse and would leave the poor vulnerable to exploitation.—AFP