Police have detained three medical workers for illegally conducting kidney transplants, a local news website iqilu.com reported Thursday.

Police in Bazhou, North China's Hebei province said they raided the clinic after being tipped off medical workers from a public hospital in East China's Shandong province were conducting illegal kidney transplants on Sept 23.

Huang Kai, a police officer, said all the people were "stunned" when the police cracked into the locked clinic, "They were all dressed in robes. The kidney donor was lying on the operating table waiting to be anaesthetized."

However the beneficiary, who was supposed to be implanted with the kidney, had already left, repulsed by the condition of the clinic, said Huang.

Eight people, including three medical workers, were detained. The three come from Dezhou People's Hospital in Dezhou city, East China's Shandong province. They are a urinary surgeon, an anesthetist and a head nurse.

An official of the hospital surnamed Yuan told iqilu.com that the three had been away for more than 10 days, "We just heard some rumors. It's their personal behavior and has nothing to do with the hospital… we haven't been informed by any government department of such things."

The owners of the clinic are still at large. They are part of an underground national network of illegal organ transplants, and the three medical workers were introduced to the network by one of its agents, Huang said.

"They would have charged the beneficiary 280,000 yuan ($43,870), given the donator 20,000 yuan, and divided up the rest among themselves," said Huang.

The case has been reported to the public security bureau of Hebei province and the Ministry of Public Security.