China to stop using executed prisoners as source of transplant organs

Move is welcomed by human rights groups but will worsen already massive gulf between demand and donations

China’s organ donation committee says as many as 300,000 patients need transplants each year, but that only 10,000 or so receive them. Photograph: Sean Smith for the Guardian

Tania Branigan in Beijing-Thursday 4 December 2014

China will stop using executed prisoners as a source of organs for transplants from 1 January, the head of the country’s organ donation committee has said.

The move, which has been widely welcomed by human rights groups, will worsen the huge shortfall in organs in the short term. Death row prisoners have provided the overwhelming majority of transplanted organs for years, owing to high demand and low donation rates. But in future their organs will only be used if they volunteer to donate and their families approve the decision.

Huang Jiefu, head of the donation committee, told a meeting on Wednesday that almost 40 major transplant centres had already stopped using such organs, the Southern Metropolis Daily reported.

Huang, a former deputy health minister, said in late 2012 that China would end its reliance on organs from executed prisoners within two years.

He warned this week that as many as 300,000 patients need transplants each year, but that only 10,000 or so receive them. While the number of organ donations was still very low – 1,500 so far this year – he said that exceeded the amount donated between 2010 and 2013.

“I believe the situation for organ donation will get better and better,” Huang added.

Donor shortages are an international problem, but Huang noted that the average organ donation rate was 0.6 per million people in China, compared with 37 per million in Spain.

He said the low rate reflected not just Chinese cultural beliefs but anxieties about corruption. “People’s concerns over whether organ donation can be carried out in a fair, just and open manner are also an important reason why it has been so hard for the cause to advance,” he said.

As part of its transplant reforms, China has set a new national system to allocate organs on the basis of urgency, compatibility and patient need.

Mao Qun’an, spokesman for the national health and family planning commission, acknowledged this year that ensuring the new system worked as planned would be challenging.

There have already been concerns voiced about the new system. The state-run People’s Daily reported last year that an organ donation coordinator for a local branch of the Red Cross threatened to remove a critically injured patient’s breathing apparatus if relatives did not agree to donate his organs if he died.

This year, Huang told reporters that death row prisoners could still donate organs if they wished – raising questions about people’s ability to truly give informed consent under such circumstances.

Donations will require the agreement of both the prisoner and his or her parents, and will need to take place through the standard registration process used for all donors.

He Xiaoshun, another member of the committee, told the Guardian he was cautiously optimistic that public attitudes toward donations would shift, but that it would be a long-term process, requiring the central government’s influence as well as media coverage.

He added that although in traditional Chinese culture many people believe bodies must remain intact after death, more than two-thirds of young people expressed positive views on donation.

He acknowledged that the ban on organs from death row prisoners would mean a longer waiting list, but added that the impact would vary from place to place and that the use of such organs had already fallen. Five years ago, 90% of the organs used in transplant operations were from executed prisoners, while this year it was 40%, he said.

China is believed to execute more criminals than any other country. But the US-based group Dui Hua, which works on criminal justice issues, says the death toll has fallen sharply. It estimates that China executed 2,400 people last year; a steep drop from 12,000 in 2002.

• Additional research by Luna Lin