Hyderabad: With two lakh patients requiring transplants or suffering from chronic diseases, the demand for kidneys is very high in India and supply is just a fraction of the demand. There are 40,000 patients waiting for kidneys in Telangana and AP.
Despite such a high demand, only about 10,000 transplants are carried out in the country, of which 5,000 are cleared by the authorisation committee, another 4,000 are from cadavers or from brain dead patients and 1,000 are donated by close relatives.
The director of health and medical education Dr S. Ramani said, “The proposals submitted by the hospital for those whose blood groups are matching requires very fine scrutiny. Both donor and recipient are interviewed separately and if there is any doubt then the transplant is rejected. Eighty per cent of the applications are not accepted as the answers are either too vague or the donor’s reason for donation is not convincing.”
Only in the case of a child donating for a parent, permission from the authorisation committee is not required. Presently, a lot of stress is being laid on cadaver donations as these organs can be effectively utilised for chronic kidney patients.
Dr Pradeep Deshpande, president of Indian Society of Nephrology said, “The Human Organ Transplant Act was ratified in 1995 with the main provisions to discourage commercial transactions of human organs and encourage cadaver transplantation. Hence a lot of stress is being placed on Jeevandan and on popularising the scheme further as it will help lakhs of patients.”
But at the same time, there have been too little efforts taken up to control brokers.
A senior doctor said, “There is a huge network of brokers who tap people in need of money and lure them into selling their kidneys. What is not explained to these donors are the dangers of such an act and also how they are risking their lives. These brokers go underground when incidents come to light and once things settle down they are back in action. They need to be targeted first to stop this racket, which has not been done so far.”
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