NA unanimously passes organ transplant bill

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a landmark bill to regulate transplants of human organs in the country, making their sale and unauthorised transplant punishable with up to 10 years in prison.

The house suspended some rules to take up the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Bill immediately after the standing committee on health presented its report on the draft based on a Musharraf-era ordinance and adopted it without a debate to honour Pakistan’s iconic kidney transplant surgeon Dr Adeeb Rizvi, who had campaigned for framing such a law and was present in a visitors’ gallery to witness the proceedings.

Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Speaker Fehmida Mirza and members from all parliamentary groups made brief remarks after the vote to congratulate the house for adopting the important bill, which will become permanent law after its passage by the Senate, and to praise Dr Adeeb’s services in the field.

An identical bill introduced in the previous National Assembly on Aug 17, 2007 could not be taken up for a vote before the house ran out its tenure but it was saved in the form of an ordinance promulgated by then president Pervez Musharraf on Sept 4 the same year.

The ordinance is one of 37 Musharraf decrees which need parliament’s approval by Nov 28 to remain in the field after losing the cover of the former military president’s controversial Nov 3, 2007 emergency proclamation held unconstitutional by a Supreme Court ruling on July 31.

The bill provides for a regulatory mechanism, including a high-level federal monitoring authority and evaluation committees, for the removal, storage and transplantation of human organs and tissues for therapeutic purposes and prohibits the practice of their sale to foreigners which gave Pakistan the reputation of a virtual kidney bazaar where rich foreign patients could buy kidneys from poor people for transplantation at local kidney centres.

The new law will allow a voluntary organ or tissue donation by at least an 18-year-old living donor to any other ‘genetically and legally related’ person, who is a close relative such as a parent, son, daughter, sister, brother and spouse, with authorisation from an evaluation committee of specialists in the field helped by local notables to be set up for every medical institution and hospital where at least 25 transplants are carried out annually.
‘In case of non-availability of (such) a donor …, the evaluation committee may allow donation by a non ‘close blood relative’ after satisfying itself that such donation is voluntary,’ the bill says.

‘In the case of regenerative tissue, i.e. stem cells, there is no restriction of age between siblings,’ it further says.

The bill also provides for donation to be effective after death if a person aged at least 18 years, authorises any medical institution or hospital approved by a 10-member monitory authority headed by the health minister and including heads of organisations of the medical profession and specialists.

It says transplants and removal of human organs ‘shall only be carried out’ by recognised professionals after a written certification from an evaluation committee.

The bill prescribes an imprisonment for up to 10 years and a fine of up to one million rupees for those involved in the removal and human organs without the prescribed authority as well as their sale. Contravention of other provisions of the law will be punishable with up to three years of imprisonment or with a fine of up to Rs300,000, or with both. A medical practitioner convicted for unauthorised removal of human organs for transplant will also be liable to ‘appropriate action’ by the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council, including removal from its register for three years for the first offence and permanently for the subsequent offence.

Earlier, Minister of State for Law and Justice Mohammad Afzal Sandhu introduced a bill seeking an amendment in the Code of Civil Procedure aimed at checking what its statement of objects and reasons called ‘frivolous litigation’ by enhancing the amount of compensatory costs to be awarded by a court to Rs100,000 from the existing Rs25,000.

Email On Deck: A disposable email address that works

Today, Team Inforpioneer brings an interesting Email service for our reader which will definitely help our readers to improve their internet security and will benefit in some other ways. Here is a short description of this service. EmailOnDeck.com is the premier site for all things relating to temporary, disposable and throwaway email addresses. We want to help you avoid SPAM, protect your online privacy, and stop you from having to give away your personal email address to every company and person on the internet who insists on you giving it to them. We work hard and will continue to work hard to give you a disposable email address that works with any site or app. We hope to help give you back the control of deciding who you want to give your personal info to. Temporary emails are perfect for any transaction where you want to improve your online privacy. Use them when you buy or sell Bitcoins or trade cryptocurrency, at exchanges, or locally. They can be used for QA testing of e

Cell Phone Buying Guide 2010

I outline some of the most important factors to look into when purchasing a new cell phone. When your old cell phone squeaks like a rusty door hinge, has more lint under the screen than your jean pockets, and lasts half an afternoon with a full charge, it’s time for a new one. But with most cell phone contracts lasting two years, a new phone shouldn’t be the type of purchase you make lightly. Check out our quick and dirty guide to your next phone purchase to make sure you cover all the bases on your shopping trip. Choosing a carrier Because most U.S. cell phone carriers heavily subsidize phone purchases in exchange for two-year contracts, and lock the phones to their networks, your choice of cell carrier will have more impact on which type of phone you end up with than any other factor. If you already have carrier and feel satisfied with it, the choice is easy. If not, you’ll need to choose one. AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon dominate the cell phone market in the States. Speak

Top 101 Ways to Promote a New Blog

Promoting a new blog can be quite daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. As you might expect, breaking down blog promotion into small, actionable tasks eliminates the mental road block you’ve probably experienced when trying to wrap you head around how to get people’s attention. You don’t have to do everything in this list, and some items will have a greater effect then others, but every tactic will at least drive some traffic, and any traffic is better than no traffic. Content 1. Write a list of over 100+ resources or ideas. 2. Write the definitive guide to something. Spend time making this awesome. 3. Release a manifesto . 4. Release 2 manifestos . 5. Interview cool people. People like talking about cool people. 6. After your articles are indexed in search engines, break them up into smaller articles and submit them to ezinearticles.com (and other article directories). 7. Or just pay someone to submit the articles for you . 8. Write a list of all the cool blogs and people in your nich

Info Pioneer

Search This Blog