The Organ Transplant Law went into effect in 1997. Between February 1999 and March 2006, organs from 44 brain-dead people were used for 167 transplants, which involved hearts, lungs, livers, pancreases, kidneys and small intestines. But the number is extremely small compared with the United States, where about 2,000 heart transplants are carried out every year.
Responding to the voices of patients waiting for transplant organs, lawmakers have submitted two revision proposals to the Diet. However, if the Diet deliberations focus only on the technical side of the matter -- how to make organ transplants easier and how to increase the number of transplants -- it will be difficult to receive public support and a revised law will not function as expected.
Under the 1997 law, brain death as a valid criterion for pronouncing death is applied only to those who have agreed to be donors. Donors must give written consent that they are willing to subject themselves to brain-death diagnosis and the harvesting of their organs for transplant. Only people aged 15 or older can give such consent. Since children under that age cannot become organ donors for transplants in other children, many seriously sick children travel abroad to receive organs. Transplant operations are so expensive that in most cases the patients' parents and supporters try to cover costs by soliciting funds from the public.