October 12, 2015
Drive to increase organ donations
![Watermark](/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/logo-4.png)
![Drive to increase organ donations](https://waateanews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/organ-transplant.jpg)
Health Minister Jonathan Coleman wants to increase the rate of organ donation, including addressing the extremely low rate among Maori and Pasifika.
Announcing the terms of reference for a review of the problem, he says New Zealand’s rate is about 10 per million people compared with 16 per million people in Australia and 36 per million in Spain.
Last year there were just 46 deceased organ donations carried out in this country, and there needs to be more to help the 700 people accepted for a kidney transplant and around 40 people for liver, cardiac or lung transplants.
Last year’s Budget allocated $4 million over four years to set up a National Renal Transplant Service to increase the number of live kidney donor transplantations.
Earlier funding included $1.8 million to find clinical trials at Middlemore Hospital looking at how to overcome barriers to live donor kidney transplantation in Pasifika and Maori patients.
Copyright © 2015, UMA Broadcasting Ltd: www.waateanews.com