Human organ transplant bill passed, 3yrs jail for illegal trade

Parliament today passed the Transplantation of Human Organs Bill, 2018 with a provision of 3 years of rigorous imprisonment or Tk 10 lakh fine or both for violation of the law in a bid to check the illegal trade of human organs.

Health minister Mohammad Nasim placed the bill before the House.

The House with Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury in the chair passed the bill by voice votes rejecting the amendment motions forwarded by the opposition lawmakers.

While placing the bill, Nasim said the law is aimed at improving the country's health care services keeping consistency with advancement of medical science.

According to the bill, no hospital can conduct human organ transplantation in the country without government's approval while the public hospitals having specialised units in this regard can do the job without taking prior approval.

If any hospital wants to carry out such transplantation, it can apply before the government after meeting some certain conditions, the bill says.

 The government may allow the hospital to conduct the operation if satisfied.

Hospitals have to apply to the authorities concerned to do the job within 60 days of enactment of the law.

The government may revoke the license of hospitals for the violation of the law.

The proposed law also defines close relationship as the relatives like parents, children, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives as well as blood-related grandparents, grandchildren, cousins, maternal and paternal uncles, and aunts.

According to the law, any organ transplantable to the human body, including kidney, liver, bone, eye, heart, lung and tissue, could be transplanted after their collection from human bodies having heartbeats or in active with life support for transplantation purpose.

The law mentions that there will be a medical board in every hospital for deciding the transplantation matter and a National Cadaveric Committee to oversee the human organs transplantation in the country.

Organ donation is the donation of biological tissue or an organ of the human body from a living or dead person to a living recipient who needs a transplantation.