Is Post-Mortem Organ Donation a Duty Towards Society and Can It Be Justified by Public Interest? Recent Bills to Amend the German Transplantation Law

The issue of organ donation from deceased donors remains unsatisfactorily resolved in Germany. The number of donors has remained very low in recent years. Consequently, the German Bundestag was holding a debate on two MP bills aimed at amending the organ transplantation law. Two main bills were presented by different groups of MPs. The more controversial of them, supported by the Minister of Health, tried to introduce the opt-out model into Germany’s organ transplantation system. The second one aimed to improve the existing opt-in model. During the final voting, the Bundestag decided against the opt-out model and in favour of the improved opt-in one. In some experts’ eyes, an opt-out model imposes an obligation on the citizens to donate an organ after brain death. Can such a duty to the society be justified by public interest or other principles? The goal of this article is to offer an answer to this question by analysing the provisions of the German constitution.

Pot do ustanovitve Slovenija-transplanta

Transplantation medicine is a rather young medical field. As a method of treatment human organs are used. These organs are donated with the aim to help fellow humans plagued by disease or in desperate situation. First condition for a successful treatment is developing a program that will take care of procuring the necessary organs. This should be an independent activity which requires appropriate addressing of professional, juridical, organizational and ethical aspects.In 1970, Slovenia started kidney transplantation from living related donors. As long as the transplantation activity covered only kidney transplants of the living donors, all the activities were conducted by nephrologists. Act on removal and transplantation of human body parts for medical purposes issued in 1985, and Rules on detailed medical criteria and the methods for determining occurrence of brain death of the person from whom it is permitted to take body parts for transplantation for treatment in 1986, made it possible to transplant organs from deceased donors. With the transition to deceased donor organs and the possibility of transplanting other organs (heart, liver, lungs, pancreas), it became necessary to organize these activities on national level. In 1992 Extended expert council for transplantation was established. The council planned all the necessary procedures for the construction of National transplantation network, the establishment of 24-hour coordination and the fastest way of passing of a transplantation law which enabled the establishment of Slovenia-transplant in 2000.After the establishment of 24-hour central coordination the number of organs procured from deceased donors has increased substantially. Slovenia has reached a similar number of organs obtained from deceased donors per million inhabitants, as member countries of the Eurotransplant association. At the same time the system was safe, reliable, transparent and properly regulated. Slovenia could therefore start negotiations for joining Eurotransplant. Even before the formal establishment of Slovenija Transplant, Slovenia became full member of the association.