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4 years ago

HC suggests 9-point guidelines for organ donation

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The High Court in a full text of a judgement suggested to adopt the 9-point guidelines of the ‘Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Rules, 2014 of India’ and directed the government to amend the Organ Transplantation Act-1999 (amended in 2018) accordingly within six months.

The High Court said in its judgement, “We  may  profitably  refer  to  the  Transplantation  of Human  Organs  and  Tissues  Rules,  2014  of  India wherein  some  guidelines  on  how  the  Authorization Committees  in  India  regulate  emotional  donation. In Bangladesh, we can adopt the guidelines which are spelt out as follows.”

The guidelines are--- (a) Evaluate  that  there  is  no  commercial transaction between the recipient and the donor  and  that  no  payment  has  been made  to  the  donor  or  promised  to  be made to the donor or any other person; (b) Prepare an explanation of the link between them and the circumstances which led to the offer being made; (c) Examine the reasons why the donor wishes to donate; (d) Examine the documentary evidence of the link.

The guidelines also included (e) Examine  old  photographs  showing  the donor and the recipient together; (f) Evaluate  that  there  is  no  middleman  or tout involved; (g) Evaluate the financial status of the donor and the recipient by asking them to give in support of their vocations and the income for the previous  three financial  years  and  any  gross  disparity between  the  status  of  the  two  must  be evaluated    in    the    backdrop    of    the objective    of    preventing    commercial dealing; (h) Ensure that the donor is not a drug addict.

It also included (i) Ensure  that  the  near  relative  or  if  near relative is not available, any adult person related to the donor by blood or marriage interviewed  regarding  awareness  about his/her   intention   to   donate   an   organ/ tissue,   the   authenticity   of   the   link between the donor and the recipient, and the  reasons  for  donation,  and  any  strong views  or  disagreement  or  objection  of such kin shall also be recorded and taken note of.

 “Besides, we think, there should be an evaluation of the mental health of the donor and the Authentication Board will have to apprise the intended donor of the possible adverse effects, if any, of kidney donation,” added the court.

The court also said, “If following  the  above-mentioned  guidelines,  the  authenticity  of  an emotional  donation by a known or related donor (but  not  unknown  or unrelated)  is  ascertained  rigorously by the Authentication  Board,  there  will be  a  check  and  balance  and  the  possibility  of  illegal  kidney  trade  will  be greatly  minimized.”

 “The donor must donate his kidney to the recipient under a well regulated legal regimen. In this regard, the act no 05 of 1999 and the rules of the 2018 must be amended accordingly,” also read the full text of the verdict.

The HC bench of Justice Moyeenul Islam Chowdhury and Justice Khandaker Diliruzzaman delivered the verdict on December 5 last year and the full text of the judgement released recently.

One Fatema Zohra filed the petition with the HC in 2017, challenging the constitutionality of sections 2(Ga), 3 and 6 of the Organ Transplantation Act 1999 [amended in 2018]. These sections mainly focused on the definition of the related persons.

Fatema donated a kidney to her ailing daughter Fahmida, but the kidney got damaged after a year. Then she managed a donor for her daughter, but the donor could not donate the kidney due to the bar in the law. Later, Fatema submitted the petition to the HC, seeking necessary order on the issue.

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