Around a million more people registered to become organ donors in the last year, figures show.
There are now 16.5 million people on the UK organ donor register – around a 7% rise since June 2008, when experts began implementing recommendations from the Organ Donation Taskforce. More than one in four members of the population are now on the register, while there has been an 11% rise in the number of people donating after death – providing 174 extra transplants. Commenting on the report of progress made in the first year of the Organ Donation Taskforce Implementation Programme, chairman of the BMA’s Medical Ethics Committee, Dr Tony Calland, said: “We very much hope the 50% increase in donation rates, predicted by the Organ Donation Taskforce, will be achieved in the next five years. But there will still be a shortage of donors and people will still be dying waiting for an organ. Now is the time to have a serious debate about changing to a system of presumed consent (opt-out) for organ donation.”
