Panaji (Goa) With the proper facilities required for organ harvesting in place in Goa, the national authority regulating the process has said that Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar can play pivotal role in setting the ball rolling.

“Goa Chief minister Manohar Parrikar has to play a pivotal role in getting the organ harvesting facility set up in the state. We need to have a State Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (SOTTO) here,” Dr Vimal Bhandari, Director, National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTA) said.

Bhandari who is down in Goa on the invitation of Indian Medical Association’s Goa Unit met Parrikar yesterday at Porvorim and discussed the issues related to organ harvesting and transplants.

“The Chief Minister really wants to give the support but he is little bit apprehensive about the legal matter,” he said.

“The rules about organ harvesting and transplant are very strict. The illegal organ transplant issue is not so big in the country. Everybody is following the rules and regulations,” said Bhandari.

The medical professionals in the State are stressing for such a facility in the State claiming that the infrastructure required for it is ready.

Bhandari said that nationally the scenario on organ harvesting of deceased is “very good.” “If you compare for last three years. We started from scratch, only 800 organs transplant annually in 2013 to 4,000 annually last year.”

“We have 301 centres in the country which is doing this activity out of which 200 registered with us. At national level we have trained 10,000 coordinators from different part of the country,” he said.

“We have also trained lot many retrieval surgeons. We started from 9,000 pledges and now we have 13 lakh pledges of organs with us. Our target is to have 20 lakh pledges this year,” Bhandari said.

“We have good infrastructure like Manipal hospital in Goa. We need to promote decease organ donation campaign simply because we are adding around two lakh people every year in the pool of patients,” he said.
Team TNV