According to an Australian study, Chinese surgeons harvested the hearts of death row prisoners before they were medically brain-dead. 

Australian National University researchers reviewed thousands of medical papers, finding evidence of at least 71 patients where the removal of the heart was the official cause of death.

It’s estimated that the actual figure is much higher.

Co-author Matthew Robertson says it means the Chinese government was paying surgeons to perform executions.

“It’s not an execution that’s happening out on a field with a firing squad,” he said.

“This is happening in the operating room. Based on all of the descriptions in the papers about the medical equipment that’s available and the precision of the surgery and so on.”

China says it stopped harvesting organs in 20-15, but human rights groups argue the practice still happens.

The co-author of the study said the number of transplants occurring is in the five figure mark.

“It’s almost certainly in the tens of thousands annually. According to Chinese officials, they want to get to 50 thousand transplants annually by 2023,” he said.

Press PLAY to hear the full details of what the ANU study uncovered.