LAHORE, July 1: Police have detected at least 10 more private hospitals in Lahore which are involved in illegal kidney trade, reveals an investigator.

Three private hospitals — Masood, Rasheed and Shaafi — have already been charged with doing the business.

DIG (Investigation) Tassaduq Husain told Dawn on Friday that the police had detected 10 more private health facilities in Lahore that were involved in illegal kidney transplant business. However, they had either stopped the activity for the time being or were doing it very carefully after the (police) action against the three hospitals, he said.

“We can’t initiate action against them (suspected hospitals) without receiving a complaint,” he said, adding that without a legal cover it was very difficult to proceed against them on their own.

Mr Husain said the case against the owners of the three hospitals could only be possible on the statements of two victims that they had been deprived of their organs ‘forcibly’. The victims had forgiven the accused after receiving compensatory amounts, he added.

The DIG said no legal action could be taken against a doctor who deprived a person of his kidney with his consent.

An advocate of Supreme Court, Malik Manzoor told this reporter that illegal kidney trade was a heinous crime and the police could challenge the compromise of two parties in such case in a superior court as the state was a party to every case.

Sources said about 100 foreigners would visit Lahore for kidney transplant every month before the police action against the three hospitals, but now they turned towards Rawalpindi, Multan and Karachi.

Though the cabinet division has approved the proposed draft of the Transplantation of Human Organ Tissue Ordinance 2007 to address the issue, it has not been presented in the National Assembly for debate so far for the reasons best known to the authorities concerned.

Over a decade ago, a draft proposal in this regard was made but it could not be realised into a law.

It is learnt that non-related kidney transplant has been banned all over the world, but the practice is rampant in Pakistan. According to an investigator, an amount between 15,000 and 20,000 US dollars is charged from a foreigner for kidney transplant and over Rs500,000 from a local. On the other hand, a private clinic or hospital offers hardly between Rs50,000 and Rs100,000 to a willing donor and that, too, is often denied. —Zulqernain Tahir