Organ trafficking, transplant tourism and transplant commercialism threaten to undermine the practice of transplantation worldwide, according to an international summit held in Istanbul recently, convenved by The Transplantation Society and the International Society of Nephrology.
The meeting resulted in the Declaration of Istanbul on Organ Trafficking and Transplant Tourism. According to the summit, for more than two decades governments around the world have seen that there is a need to protect the poor and disempowered from exploitation by commercial concerns recruiting organ donors. However, in spite of this, partly because of the increase in demand for organs, organ trafficking and transplant tourism have become growing global problems. Vulnerable populations (such as illiterate and impoverished individuals, undocumented immigrants, prisoners, and political or economic refugees) in resource-poor countries are now a major source of organs for rich patient-tourists who are prepared to travel and can afford to purchase organs. WHO has estimated that about 10% of organ transplants around the world involve these unacceptable activities and in some countries the rate is much higher. For example, by 2006, two-thirds of the 2000 kidney transplants in Pakistan were for foreign recipients.
The summit also proposes that prohibitions on these activities should involve bans on all types of advertising, soliciting or brokering. The declaration describes universal approaches for the provision of care for the living donor, and also emphasises the need for effective practices that support organ donation from dead donors.
