Adoption of a new law regulating human organ transplantation, as the latest developments indicate, is not far away. The parliamentary standing committee on health and family welfare ministry, according to a news report, completed its scrutiny of a relevant bill and submitted it before the House Sunday last. The enactment of the law is necessary to effectively discourage illegal trade of human organs, in most cases, involving poor and low-income people and facilitate wider availability of human organs from lawful sources. Stories do often hit news headlines how poor and innocent people are lured and trapped to sell their precious organs, kidneys in particular, in exchange for a paltry sum of money.
Incidents of forcible extraction of organs from humans for their trading purposes do also come to light, occasionally. A section of unscrupulous people, including some medical professionals, is allegedly involved in human organ trafficking. Out of desperation, relatives of some patients and poor people do quite often step into the traps, meticulously laid down by the organ traffickers. Illegal trade in human organs does certainly need to be stopped and people involved in such criminal activities, punished. However, the necessity of keeping the provisions for voluntary donations of organs by non-relatives cannot be overlooked. For instance, about 30,000 people die of kidney-related ailments in the country and specialists say that the life of at least two-thirds of these patients could be saved through kidney transplantation. But it is really hard to manage kidneys for transplantation.
The proposed law, now awaiting parliamentary approval, is reported to have incorporated some provisions in order to ensure a controlled mechanism for organ transplantation. But how effective those will be cannot be predicted right at this moment. "The Transplantation of Human Organs Bill, 2017" prohibits human organ transplantation in the country without government's approval barring the public hospitals having specialised units to do the job. Besides, there will be a medical board in every hospital to take decision on organ transplantation and a cadaveric committee to oversee transplantation. The proposed law, if passed, will replace an identical law and also allow grandparents, grandchildren and first cousins to donate organs along with parents, spouses, children, siblings, and blood-related aunts and uncles.
There is no denying that organ transplantation is part of advanced medical practices and people who are in need of the same should not be deprived of such benefits. The health ministry needs to facilitate lawful organ transplantation unhindered. If the law is passed, it would be necessary to make the process of approval by the relevant hospital and government agencies easy and hassle-free. Usually, the patients needing organ transplantation suffer physically and emotionally and their close relatives financially. A cumbersome process of approving organ donation would only add to their sufferings. The government might also consider allowing the use of organs of 'brain death' patients with consent duly received from their close relatives.
It is important to have legal deterrents to human organ trade. On this count, the far more critical area of action is enforcement of the law. This would matter most to fulfil the prime objectives of the proposed law. Above everything, the government's goal should be to check illegal trade in organs and help the patients arrange organs from lawful sources and transplant the same at the lowest possible cost. Every individual has the right to life and the government should do its best to uphold that right.
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