An MP has called on the government to ban the sale of human remains after learning about "loopholes" in the Human Tissue Act 2004. Here's my analysis of a parliamentary exchange that could mark the beginning of the end for Britain's most macabre market.
Story in a flash
On Wednesday (Nov. 20), Labour's Bell Ribeiro-Addy told the Commons that human remains are sold at auction and on social media and asked the government to end what she described as a "depraved practice."
The MP for Clapham and Brixton Hill in London said that sales included "a foetal skeleton posed under a glass dome, a human thigh bone turned into a cane, a human jawbone necklace and the varnished skull of a six-year-old."
Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner responded by describing the account as "absolutely horrifying" and said she will ensure that a meeting is made with the appropriate minister.
What does this mean?
This is a significant step forward for academics and activists who have been rallying against human remains sales in recent months.
The parliamentary exchange follows in the wake of an auction house in Oxfordshire withdrawing 22 lots of human and ancestral remains after facing an international backlash from affected communities and academics.
However, while auctions have become a lightning rod for controversy, they're only a small part of the market, and politicians will have to consider a variety of factors before prohibiting the sale of human remains.
A ban would also put a small number of people who make a living from selling human remains out of business.
A tale of two auctions
Ribeiro-Addy said in the Commons that she met with a group from the British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO).
The BABAO Trading and Sale of Human Remains Task Force, which requested the meeting with Ribeiro-Addy, investigates the human remains trade and objectification and commodification of the dead. They were one of several groups that objected to the Oxfordshire auction last month.
Dr Lauren McIntyre, co-coordinator of the group, told me they have been writing letters to auction houses objecting to sales for some time, but it wasn't enough.
"It's like trying to stop a crack in a dam by just sticking your finger in it," McIntyre said. "We were never ever going to be able to stay on top of all these sales just by us sending ad hoc letters."
McIntyre decided to approach Ribeiro-Addy after seeing the MP quoted in The Guardian as saying the sale of human remains should be outlawed. Ribeiro-Addy spoke to The Guardian about a separate auction in May — on that occasion, a Dorset auction house withdrew Egyptian human skulls.
"Just seeing Bell's quote made me think, finally, there's actually somebody in Parliament who cares about this as much as we do," McIntyre said.
Ribeiro-Addy told me that she's been aware of people selling human remains since intervening in the Dorset auction. However, she hadn't realised the extent of what was going on until meeting with the BABAO group.
"They were telling me how bad it's got and the loopholes that people were using," Ribeiro-Addy said.
The BABAO group highlighted that collectors are turning human remains into objects and jewellery — I reported on this desecration of human remains for Live Science in 2022. Ribeiro-Addy said that she wanted human remains to be treated with dignity.
"If we're treating human remains with dignity, then we're not going to buy and sell them, particularly online in the way that it's happening like they're items on Amazon," she said. "It's just not right."
Ribeiro-Addy also noted that she was "shocked" to learn in the BABAO meeting that animal remains are often better protected than human remains.
A variety of animal remains require paperwork. You need a license to keep a dolphin skull, for example. There are no such restrictions on human remains, and the vast majority are sold without paperwork.
Legal loopholes
Ribeiro-Addy spoke in the Commons of a "loophole" in the Human Tissue Act 2004. That "loophole" is that the act is silent on the sale of human remains — unless they're used for transplants.
Parliament would need to update the Human Tissue Act 2004 or introduce a new act to expressly prohibit the sale of human remains, which the BABAO group recognises could be complicated.
"The thing that became very, very apparent in the meeting was that it's not a very straightforward process," McIntyre said. "There are so many different laws that this could affect, and we don't want to hamper any other activities in the country that legitimately use human remains."
Essentially, the group doesn't want to stop researchers from being able to purchase human remains. One example McIntyre gave is tissues used in biomedical sciences that come from imports. However, the group does want to stop sales that feed the collectors' market.
Ribeiro-Addy and the task force also raised the issue of people modifying human remains to create objects. This practice is also not illegal under existing legislation and would require separate consideration.
The Human Tissue Authority (HTA) regulates organisations using human remains for specific purposes, such as medical treatment and public display, to ensure they are treated with dignity and respect. However, they have no authority over what people do with human remains in private possession.
Sexual penetration of a corpse is illegal under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, but that's really the only thing you can't do with human remains in the privacy of your own home in most of the UK. Desecrating or mutilating a corpse isn't a crime in England, Wales and Northern Ireland — it is in Scotland.
Outraging public decency can apply to those tampering with human remains in public and there are potentially some restrictions around sharing images of the remains, but the remains themselves aren't protected — please read my Live Science investigation for more details.
Where do the human remains come from?
Ribeiro-Addy is the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Afrikan reparations and noted in the Commons that human remains often come from "Indigenous communities in Africa and Asia" — though she described human remains sales as "abhorrent" regardless of origin or age.
The Oxfordshire auction last month highlighted that there are human remains from Indigenous communities for sale. However, in my experience of monitoring the trade, remains from Indigenous communities make up only a small part of the market.
The most common human remains for sale are historically linked to medical science and education — often described as "ex-medical." Many of these bones would have been purchased as learning aids by aspiring doctors or dentists in the 20th Century. In decades past, it wasn't uncommon for medical students to buy half a skeleton with their books.
Many of the bones in private possession would have come from India — at the peak of the medical bone trade in 1984, India exported 60,000 skeletons and skulls to Britain and other countries. However, there are also lots of bones from Europe for sale.
The medical bone trade has a long and complicated history, advancing the field of medicine and helping medical students become doctors, but also linked to graverobbing and the exploitation of impoverished communities.
Other human remains for sale include those that have been grave robbed or looted in modern times for the collectors' market and those that have clearly come out of the ground at some point but are otherwise unidentifiable.
Reaction from sellers
I spoke with two sellers who make their money from human remains linked to the medical bone trade. Neither objected to a ban on certain human remains, such as those from Indigenous communities, but both felt those from the medical bone trade should be allowed.
"An outright ban on the sale of human bones would be irresponsible," said Chris Bull, a human remains seller based in Bristol. "There are most likely still tens of thousands of medical skeletons privately owned by medical professionals who purchased them whilst they were students."
Bull argues that while many of these bones were sourced unethically, many were donated, and repatriation is impossible — no one has ever done it to my knowledge.
"I would suggest rather than an outright ban on medical skeletons, only licenced individuals and companies should be able to sell and own them," Bull said. "I would suggest the introduction of transfer certificates in order to trace the skeletons so that there is full traceability and for owners to register each specimen."
The second seller, who wished to remain anonymous, echoed Bull's sentiments about regulation. However, they felt what happened last week was inevitable, given what they see as widespread graverobbing and human remains not being treated with respect.
"I'm not surprised," the seller said. "This is a long time coming."
While there's no guarantee that the parliamentary exchange will lead to new legislation, the second seller is already anticipating a blanket ban.
"I'm currently thinking that I'm just going to try and sell up to an American client," the seller said. "It kills my entire business."
Would a ban work?
A ban would have a significant impact on the human remains collectors' market. People would no longer be able to openly trade in body parts, preventing sellers who abide by the law profiting off human remains and discouraging first-time buyers.
I explained in a previous post that Facebook and Instagram are the major hubs for dealing in the dead. You can find human remains for sale elsewhere, including at auctions and in physical shops, but social media is where most of the action is.
Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, prohibits the sale of body parts and fluids, but it's easy to find sellers openly advertising the remains of adults, children and babies on these platforms. The scale of the trade is such that a ban is unlikely to completely kill it.
"If the UK tried a full stop ban, it might stop sales via auction houses or brick and mortars, but online sales, especially via social media, will likely continue in some form," said Dr Damien Huffer, an interdisciplinary illicit trafficking researcher and founding member of The Alliance to Counter Crime Online NGO.
Huffer, who is also the co-author of "These Were People Once: The Online Trade in Human Remains and Why It Matters" (Berghahn Books, 2023), added that he would expect that US and EU markets "might pick up some of the slack" if the UK is seen as too risky. Despite this, Huffer very much welcomes the prospect of a UK ban.
"It would still be one of the most positive developments seen in this fight in a long time," he said.
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