A new legislation finally aims to regulate organ transplants, reports Reem Leila The People's Assembly (PA) legislative and health committees finished reviewing a long awaited draft law to regulate organ transplants on Saturday. The new legislation seeks to increase the number of organs available for transplant and curtail the booming trade in human organs. It legalises a wide range of transplant operations, restricting surgery to hospitals affiliated to the Health Ministry. The draft will now be referred to the Shura Council before it is passed to the People's Assembly (PA) for final approval. "The law will put an end to the illegal organ trade. Donors will have to agree to donate organs for free," said PA Speaker Fathi Sorour. Debate over proposed legislation to regulate transplants has tended to concentrate on defining clinical death. Under the draft law the decision to pronounce death will be exercised by committees of three experts who must agree unanimously after conducting 14 mandatory tests. Minister of Health Hatem El-Gabali points out that organ transplants from the clinically dead are legal in more than 80 countries, including Saudi Arabia. Hamdi El-Sayed, head of both the PA's Health Committee and the Doctors' Syndicate, says the 18-article draft law envisions the creation of an independent body to manage a national organ bank, screen potential recipients and donors, and monitor all operations. Where transplants from a living donor are involved, the law will require the donor to be over 21 years and closely related to the recipient. Both restrictions aim to discourage the exploitation of minors and transplant tourism. Any donor must be of sound mind, and will have the right to reverse their decision at any point prior to the transplant procedure. Currently Egypt has no legislation regulating organ transplants. Though they are supposed to meet Doctors' Syndicate rules and Health Ministry guidelines, both have proved difficult to enforce. El-Sayed said he is "optimistic this time the new law will be approved soon". He anticipates a temporary decline in the number of available organs following the draft's passage into law as authorities work to shut down commercial organ trading and begin a campaign to convince the public to donate organs upon death. "We think there will be a fall in the number of available organs for three or four years. It is going to take time to convince people to become donors. But when you consider that road accidents alone claim more than 7,000 lives each year, if just half of the casualties had agreed to become organ donors, each with six to eight vital organs, we could save an additional 20,000 lives a year." The Health Ministry has already begun a crackdown on illegal transplants. In recent months two private medical centres in Cairo have been closed and doctors, mediators and lab workers arrested for violating Doctors' Syndicate rules, says Health Ministry official spokesman Abdel-Rahman Shahin. "They work after midnight," he said, "In hospitals that often lack the facilities to conduct such major operations." The World Health Organisation (WHO) has identified Egypt as one of five organ trafficking hot spots. Over 95 per cent of kidney transplants, and at least 30 per cent of partial liver transplants, are between non-related donors and recipients, a strong indication that payment is involved. Brokers, laboratories and hospital staff have all been incriminated in the organ trade, either taking a cut to procure donors, or forging documents to circumvent rules prohibiting transplants to non- Egyptian nationals.
