Govt calls for promoting organ donation in the country

Urging all to come forward and donate their organs, Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare (HFW) Anupriya Patel on Monday stressed the need to improve infrastructure and capacity of government hospitals for undertaking transplantation to benefit even those who cannot afford transplantation.

In India, it was mainly living donors who were donating organs and only about 23 per cent of the organ transplant was being done with organs obtained from the cadavers, the minister said.

“There is a need to promote cadaver or deceased organ donation rather than relying on living donors in order to avoid the risk of commercial trading of organs and also to avoid the inherent risk to the health of the living donor,” Patel said while addressing a gathering organised to observe the Indian Organ Donation Day.

Present on the occasion, Tamil Nadu Health Minister C Vijaya Baskar highlighted the exemplary work that Tamil Nadu had done by retrieving 5,933 organs from 1,056 donors. Baskar expressed his happiness at his state being adjudged the best state in organ donation for the third time in a row. Notably, out of 85,000 patients in waitlist for getting liver, less than 3 per cent get an organ, while out of over 2 lakh kidneys organ seekers, only 8,000 manage a transplant. The waitlist for heart or lungs is even longer as hardly 1 per cent manage to get an organ.

Experts present on the occasion, stressed on including ayurvedic drugs in their drug list to cure renal disorders. “There is an acute shortage of organs in the country and also it’s not affordable for everyone. The renal societies should encourage allopathic doctors to prescribe ayurvedic formulation. There are drugs such as Neeri KFT which has potential to control kidney ailments,” an expert said.