• India
  • Nov 28
  • Mathew Gregory

National Organ Donation Day - Nov 27

Dr. Harsh Vardhan, Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare, chaired multiple events on November 27 to mark National Organ Donation Day.

Highlights

    • Around 79,572 soldiers, have been conferred by CRPF as 'Angadan warriors', who have duly filled their pledge forms to donate their eyes, skin, lungs, heart, liver, pancreas, kidneys, heart valves and intestines after death.

    • According to the National Health Portal, about 5 lakh people die every year due to non-availability of organs.

    • Goal of Organ Donation Day campaign is to remove the fear of organ donation by spreading awareness through webinars, seminars and workshops and aiming at the root of the problem by granting acceptance to organ donation.

    • National Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) at national level, the Regional Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisations (ROTTO) at regional level and the State Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisations (SOTTO) at state level are mandated for setting up network among hospitals and tissue banks for procurement and sharing of organs obtained from the deceased donors and their timely allocation.

    • Online pledging facility for organ and tissue donation is available via the NOTTO website (www.notto.gov.in) which makes it easier for citizens to pledge.

    • 12,666 organs transplanted in 2019, ranked third in the world as per data available on the WHO Global Observatory on Donation and Transplantation (GODT) website.

    • National Organ Transplant Programme (NOTP) provides financial grants for establishing ROTTOs and SOTTOs, to develop new and upgrade existing retrieval and transplant centres, to set up regional and State biomaterial centres and to provide immunosuppressive therapy to Below Poverty Line (BPL) patients who have undergone organ transplantation in a Government hospital.

    • ROTTO (West) was judged the best ROTTO in the country while the Tamil Nadu SOTTO was awarded the best State SOTTO.

    • Tamil Nadu performed a whopping 295 transplantations out of which 76 were lung transplants performed mostly on patients who suffered acute forms of COVID.

    • PGIMER, Chandigarh was judged the best hospital.

About Organ Donation

World Organ Donation Day is observed every year on 13th of August. Due to lack of awareness, there are myths and fears in peoples’ mind about organ donation. The aim of this day is to motivate normal human beings to pledge to donate organs after death, and to spread awareness about the importance of organ donation.

Organ Donation is donating a donor's organs like heart, liver, kidneys, intestines, lungs, and pancreas, after the donor dies, for the purpose of transplanting them into another person who is in need of an organ.

According to a survey In India every year about

    • 500,000 people die because of non-availability of organs, 200,000 people die due to liver disease, and 50,000 people die because of heart disease. Moreover, 150,000 people await a kidney transplant but only 5,000 get among them.

    • The organ donor can play a big role in saving others’ life. The organ of the donor can be transplanted to the patient who needs it urgently.

Facts about Organ Donation

    • Anybody can be an organ donor irrespective of their age, caste, religion, community etc.

    • There is no defined age for donating organs. The decision to donate organs is based on strict medical criteria, not age.

    • Tissues such as cornea, heart valves, skin, and bone can be donated in case of natural death but vital organs such as heart, liver, kidneys, intestines, lungs, and pancreas can be donated only in the case of ‘brain death’.

    • Organs such as the heart, pancreas, liver, kidneys and lungs can be transplanted to those recipients whose organs are failing because it allows many recipients to return to a normal lifestyle.

    • Anyone younger than age 18 needs to have the agreement of a parent or guardian to be a donor.

    • Having a serious condition like actively spreading cancer, HIV, diabetes, kidney disease, or heart disease can prevent you from donating as a living donor.

(The author is a trainer for Civil Services aspirants. The views expressed here are personal.)

Notes