Organ donation in India
[5][6] Some of the reasons behind such poor performance are lack of public awareness,[7] religious or superstitious beliefs among people, and strict laws.
After facing a multi-billion rupee kidney scandal in 2008, an amendment was proposed in 2009[11] and passed in 2011 to get rid of loopholes which previously made illegal organ trading possible.
[12][13][14] The states of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh were the frontrunners in organ donation during the initial years.
[15][16] In 2018, Tamil Nadu had an organ donation rate of 1.8 pmp, which was seven times higher than the national average (0.05-0.08).
[17] Deceased donors may donate six life-saving organs: kidneys, liver, heart, lungs, pancreas, and intestine.
[18] Organs and tissues from a person declared legally dead can be donated after consent from the family has been obtained.
[20] A "green corridor" refers to a route that is cleared out for an ambulance carrying the harvested organs to ensure its delivery at the destination in the shortest time possible.
[22] Green corridors are generally used for transporting heart and liver, which have the shortest preservation times of four to six and 12 to 15 hours, respectively.
[23] Due to the inconvenience to the public when using roads for this purpose, more prevalent usage of air ambulances or drones[27] has been suggested to the government.
Some developed countries have adopted an opt-out system, which considers every citizen an organ donor unless they decide to 'opt-out'.
[34] The potential for deceased organ donations due to brain death is high in the country.
It ranks first in deceased organ donation rate at 1.8 pmp as of 2018,[39] a figure seven times higher than the national average.
[3] In 2008, the Government of Tamil Nadu made brain death certification mandatory in the state and established the Cadaver Transplant Programme.
[42][41] This incident generated widespread attention and support for deceased organ donation in the state and was dubbed the "Hithendran effect" after the name of the donor.
A report by the NGO MOHAN Foundation found that 80% of live organ donors in the country during the years 1995 and 2021 were women, while being only 18.9% of the recipients.
[9] One way to reduce gender disparity, surgeons suggest, is to replace live transplants with cadaver transplants - to harvest organs from dead bodies for transplants - although it won't be sufficient as enrollment of recipients is expected to be skewed towards men due to factors such as women's priority being low in Indian families and women don't have a lot of agency to make such decisions.
