Wednesday, 3 July 2013

Opt-out organ donation system given go-ahead in Wales

A change in the law to bring in an opt-out organ donation system has been overwhelmingly voted through by Welsh assembly members.

Wales will become the first UK country to adopt a process where individuals will be presumed to have consented for their organs to be donated unless they opt out.

I think this is a bad idea and I do hope that the rest of the UK doesn’t follow suit and keeps the system as it is now where you have to opt-in, registering as a donor should be the decision of the individual not the state.

Presuming consent on this matter is wrong and judging by the evidence from other countries won’t actually make that much difference, in Chile when an opt-out system was introduced the number of donors fell.

Further evidence from nations with opt-out systems suggests that even if the number of donors does rise, it is only by a tiny amount with around 15 additional donors each year and approximately 45 extra organs.


Politicians are always debating and evaluating which laws need updating, scrapping, or fundamentally changing, but I think this is one situation where the original law should have been left well alone.

No comments:

Post a Comment