Illegal Trade Of Human Organs Rampant In India

By Shashank Vaid

India Correspondent

Illegal trade of human organs, especially the kidneys, is rampant in the Indian states of Kerala and Karnataka. And more groups are now demanding that the government do something about it soon.

For many young male donors, police crackdown on illegal rackets is now a fact of life. Many of these donors sell kidneys to middlemen for just US$100.

Brokers then pass them to beneficiaries through an illegal nexus involving many in the medical fraternity, making up to ten times profit.

Annually 70,000 people face kidney failures in India, but a tenth of them have to go without the organ.

Under India's Human Organ's Transplant Act, donation of the organ is allowed only to a blood relation or emotionally attached persons.

But the law's limitation has brought about a parallel illegal nexus involving brokers on the look-out for financially needy donors.

Activist groups and doctors have called for just enforcement of the law to protect both the donor and recipient.

"I think the people are educated enough to realise that there is nothing wrong in donating organs because after all they are purchasing them and they know that man who has given the organ is not going to die. They are educated enough for it to be enforced," said surgeon Dr Santokh Singh.

To put an end to the illegal trade in human organs the Indian government needs to not only strictly enforce regulation but also bring about transparency in the whole system, thereby putting an end to brokers who perpetrate this crime.

Copyright © 2003 MediaCorp News Pte Ltd.

This article posted February 23, 2003.