Executed prisoners main source of organ donation

A human organ donation pilot project is set to be expanded nationwide this year to meet a growing demand for transplants, as executed criminals are still the main source of organs, health authorities said Wednesday.

The regulations on human organ transplants will also be revised within the year to "establish an organ donation system in line with the national situation," said Huang Jiefu, vice minister of the Ministry of Health (MOH)， during a group discussion at Wednesday's session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).

Official figures show that annually there are around 1.5 million patients waiting for life-saving organ transplants, but less than 1 percent of them receive organs.

Huang pointed out that the shortage of organs has caused a bottleneck in the development of organ transplants in China.

"Due to the lack of voluntary donations from citizens, organs from dead convicts have become the principal source," Huang said.

To cope with the growing scarcity, the MOH launched a nationwide human organ donation pilot project starting March 2010. As of the end of last year, the work has expanded to 163 hospitals in 16 areas.

The MOR also launched a heart-death organ transplant pilot project in May last year.

Huang revealed that a system will be established in collaboration with the Red Cross Society of China (RCSC) to ensure better management for recipients, organs in demand, donors and organ distribution to strengthen the credibility of organ allocation.

A publicity official with the RCSC surnamed Xia told the Global Times that the organization cannot reveal information about the system at the moment, given that it is still working on details of the plan.

"The RCSC and the MOH will jointly promulgate the system by the end of March," Xia said.

The whole process will be operated by the RCSC and supervised by the MOH, according to Huang.

Liu Changqiu, an associate researcher with the Institute of Law at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, who has carried out extensive research on organ transplants, told the Global Times that it is appropriate for a third-party charity organization such as the RCSC to operate the system, despite its deteriorating public image due to last year's Guo Meimei scandal.

"To ensure the transparency and fairness of organ management, the RCSC must make public the waiting list of patients along with their detailed information such as identities and conditions," Liu said.

The severe scarcity of organ donations has resulted in a boom in the illegal trade of human organs across the country, and such cases have seen a rapid increase in recent years.

The organ providers are mostly young men from poor families.

A total of 16 suspects engaging in organ trafficking and removal, including medical personnel from hospitals, were prosecuted by the Haidian District People's Procuratorate in Beijing.

The ring had removed 51 kidneys from organ "sellers" and made profits of over 10 million yuan ($1.58 million) before it was raided, the Beijing News reported.

Liu added that the traditional Chinese notion that a man should die with remains intact has prevented people from donating their organs.

"The health authorities should further encourage people to voluntarily donate their organs after they die by raising their awareness and cracking down heavily on illegal organ transplants," he said.