The number of organ donations and transplants in China has skyrocketed after the country banned the use of organs from executed prisoners in January this year, making voluntary donations the only legitimate source for organ transplants, a former government health official said on Monday.
More than 6,000 organs had been donated by over 2,000 donors as of early October, marking a record high after concerns over a potential shortage of organs once the ban was in place, Huang Jiefu, head of the National Human Organ Donation and Transplant Committee, told the Beijing Youth Daily newspaper.
Huang said that more than 300 hospitals are slated to become qualified to perform organ transplants next year and that over 500 doctors will be trained in donation and transplant procedures.
In 2014, voluntary donations from Chinese citizens became the leading source of organs for transplant, accounting for 80 percent of all donated organs, the state-owned Xinhua News Agency reported in August.
In a survey conducted by the National Human Organ Donation and Transplant Committee in 2012 in cities across China, 40 percent of respondents said that they were "uncertain" whether they are willing to donate, largely due to uncertainties about "whether their organs will be treated fairly and transparently," according to Xinhua.
Access to donated organs is managed by local procurement organizations supervised by the National Health and Family Planning Commission (NFHPC), while distribution of the organs is handled by the China Organ Transplant Response System, an acquisition and donation system for human organs that was launched in Aug. 2013 to prevent organ trafficking.
Traditional beliefs that favor preserving bodies intact after death would also make potential donors hesitate, said Zhu Jiye, director of the Organ Transplantation Center of Peking University. Zhu advised people to try and think of organ donation as some form of continuation of their lives.
China launched a voluntary organ donation trial program in 2010 and started promoting the practice across the country in 2013.
According to a report published by the NHFPC in 2013, China has the second largest number of organ donations in the world.