A Tamil movie starring actor Sivakarthikeyan portrays a hospital administering carbon monoxide to patients to render them brain dead for harvesting organs. “Breathe”, a web television series starring actor Madhavan shows registered organ donors being murdered for organs.
When Kandivli resident Daksha Siddhpura, 51, was declared brain dead after collapsing on December 27 last year, her husband and son knew what they had to do. They rushed her to Kokilaben Hospital, Andheri, to donate her organs.
Tamil Nadu saw a double hand transplant, a multivisceral transplant including part of a stomach, highest number of lung transplants and maximum utilization of hearts in 2018. However, it lost the top slot for number of organ donations to Telangana. TN, which had topped the list for a decade, recorded a 12% decline in donations in 2018 compared to 2017.
The National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (Nimhans) will begin the groundwork to set up a “non-transplant organ retrieval centre” on its campus. The institute has already written to the state and Central governments on the proposal, where organs will be retrieved, harvested and transported to the recipient’s hospital.
University College for Women (UCW), Koti, in association with Jeevandan Cadaver Transplantation Programme, Govt of Telangana, organised an organ donation awareness walk here on Wednesday.
Medical unit of IIT Jammu organized an organ donation awareness camp in collaboration with MOHAN Foundation. The camp was organized under the supervision of Dr Karunika, Medical officer, IIT Jammu and her medical team with the co-operation of in-charge Student Welfare, Dr Anup Shukla.
A Times of India report has stated that Telangana is at the number one spot for cadaver donation in the country. 160 cadaver donations were made by brain-dead patients from the state. Close on Telangana’s heels is Tamil Nadu at the second spot, Maharashtra at the third and Karnataka at the fourth spot. According to the data collected by TOI, Telangana, Maharashtra and Karnataka also registered a yearly growth in the number of donations in 2018.
Jewellers by profession, the two were active in public life and, through the Jaipur Citizens Forum, were encouraging eye donation when they met Sunil Shroff, founder of Mohan Foundation, a pioneer in organ donation in 2013. Through a joint foundation, the MFJCF, they now encourage organ donation.
A dental hygiene awareness camp was organised at the ongoing NSS camp at Panjab University. NSS programme officer Dr Ikreet Singh gave a presentation on the importance of dental hygiene and its impact on general well-being. This was followed by dental screening examination of 232 NSS student volunteers.
Pramod Lakshman Mahajan, a 67-year-old farmer hailing from Sangli, Pune, has embarked on a journey across the country on a two-wheeler to propagate organ donation. He has taken up a 10,000-km expedition pan-India in 100 days, visiting major places to send his message across.
