A record high of about 400,000 Hong Kong residents have registered their intention to donate organs, the city’s health minister said while calling on more to join.
Secretary for Health Lo Chung-mau on Sunday revealed the increase from 360,000 potential donors in 2023, in the latest figures of the Centralised Organ Donation Register but noted that there was still room for improvement compared to the city’s 7.5 million population.
“Our aim is to achieve more breakthroughs. We hope that the figure on the register can record a transcending increase,” said Lo, speaking at the organ donation thanksgiving day.
He described organ donation as a “selfless” and “mighty” act as families facing loss and agony were willing to make other households complete.
Lo also deemed the cases of two Hong Kong infants receiving organ donations from mainland China as “miracles” after being unable to find suitable donors within the city.
Last month at Hong Kong Children’s Hospital, eight-month-old Whitney Cheung received a heart donated from across the border as there was no suitable recipient on the mainland and experts confirmed that the organ was suitable.The first case was in December of 2022 when Cleo Lai Tsz-hei, now 2, received a heart a when she was four months old. The donor was a child who had died due to a severe injury.
Speaking at the same event on Sunday, Hong Kong Society of Transplantation Council President James Fung Yan-yue also called on more residents to sign up for the register with more than 2,600 patients still waiting for an organ transplant.
Hong Kong has one of the lowest organ donation rates globally with an average of 3.6 donors in one million, he added.
Fung also said the city had less than 30 deceased donors annually in the past two years.
He added that 54 deceased organ donors saved the lives of 138 patients and 56 people with kidney or liver failure benefited from living donation in the past two years.