ISLAMABAD: Despite being passed by the Standing Committee on Cabinet Secretariat in March of this year, the National Assembly sent the ‘Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues (Amendment) Bill, 2016’ back to the Standing Committee on National Health Services (NHS) for fine tuning.

During debate on the bill, NHS Minister Saira Afzal Tarar remained active and shuttled back and forth between the opposition and treasury benches, prompting MQM legislator Ali Raza Abidi to observe that the government looked like it wanted to co-opt the legislation and present it as a government bill.

It is generally believed that several lives can be saved if just one person agrees to donate his organs after death, but there is no trend towards organ donation, awareness about the same in the country.

MNA Kishwer Zehra, who moved the bill in 2014, had also announced that she would donate her organs after her death.

The bill recommends that Computerized National Identity Card (CNIC), Diving Licenses or other identity documents should carry a separate field, specifying whether the applicant wants to donate his or her organs. This will help increase the trend towards people signing up to be organ donors.

Explaining the rationale, Mr Zehra told the house that in a rush to bury their dead, people often overlook the fact that a deceased persons’ organs could benefit up to 17 people.

“Abroad, it is standard practice to have organ donor status on all identification documents,” she said, adding that this practice would also kill off the business of the organ mafia that continued to victimize hapless citizens.

She also contended that the law had been cleared by Islamic scholars as well and should be adopted. In 2008, the Federal Shariat Court had ruled that organs can be donated to save lives.

Rather than opposing it, Ms Tarar spoke highly of the bill and said that it was very important and should be passed, but pointed out that being a major stakeholder; Nadra needed to be involved in consultations on the bill.

However, she said that another bill about human organs was already being discussed by the Senate committee on human rights and suggested that this should also be merged with the other bill and sent to the Senate.

Following debate on the house floor, Deputy Speaker Murtaza Javed Abbasi sent the bill to the standing committee on NHS for fine-tuning.

Currently, Sri Lanka is one of the only countries in the region where there is a trend towards organ donation after death. Around 5,000 eyes are donated to Pakistan from Sri Lanka every year.

Published in Dawn November 30th, 2016