The Ministry of Health and Welfare is considering whether to lift a ban on organ donations and transplants for patients who test positive for HIV in the wake of a recent incident where the children of an AIDS patient with liver cirrhosis were reportedly denied the chance to donate their organs to a critically ill parent due to the restriction.
“Participants at the first meeting called by the ministry on HIV/AIDS prevention and the rights of its sufferers on July 29 have reached an initial consensus that HIV-positive patients not be denied the opportunity to receive live organs donated by spouses or relatives within five degrees of kinship,” the ministry said in a press release yesterday.
However, organ transplants should only be performed on such patients after they are deemed psychologically and medically suitable to undergo such surgery, the ministry added.
As for the ban stipulated in the HIV Infection Control and Patient Rights Protection Act (人類免疫缺乏病毒傳染防治及感染者權益保障條例) — which prohibits HIV-infected people from donating blood or organs, or receiving organs from donors deemed to be in a permanent vegetative state — the ministry said it is set to deliberate with all sectors of society, as well as concerned specialists and organizations, on the feasibility of removing the ban in the near future.
Taiwan Organ Registry and Sharing Center chairman Lee Po-chang (李伯璋) said that while the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) targets lifting the long-standing restriction on organ transplants for HIV-affected patients, transplant surgeons were divided on the issue.
“Some surgeons are of the opinion that lifting the ban could further fuel the already serious imbalance between supply and demand for organ transplants in the nation,” Lee said.
“They also say that HIV-affected patients are less suitable for organ transplants, as the immunosuppressive drugs [anti-rejection drugs] they will be required to take should they undergo the surgery could lead to complications due to their infection,” he said.
According to statistics provided by the CDC, there are currently 8,561 HIV-free Taiwanese waiting for organ transplants, up 105 from 8,456 in the previous month, while there are an average of only 200 donors per year in the nation.
Wang Shoei-shen (王水深), a professor at National Taiwan University Hospital’s Division of Cardiovascular Surgery and head of the hospital’s heart transplant team, said patients who are HIV positive should be allowed the same medical rights as those free of the disease.
“However, while I support the lifting of the ban, it should be accompanied measures to assuage public opposition or unease,” Wang said.
TENSIONS: The Chinese aircraft and vessels were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a joint air and sea military exercise, the Ministry of National Defense said A relatively large number of Chinese military aircraft and vessels were detected in Taiwan’s vicinity yesterday morning, apparently en route to a Chinese military exercise in the western Pacific, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. In a statement, the ministry said 36 Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) aircraft, including J-16 fighters and nuclear-capable H-6 bombers, crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait or an extension of it, and were detected in the southern and southeastern parts of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) from 5:20am to 9:30am yesterday. They were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a
Honor guards are to stop performing changing of the guard ceremonies around a statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) to avoid “worshiping authoritarianism,” the Ministry of Culture said yesterday. The fate of the bronze statue has long been the subject of fierce and polarizing debate in Taiwan, which has transformed from an autocracy under Chiang into one of Asia’s most vibrant democracies. The changing of the guard each hour at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei is a major tourist attraction, but starting from 9am on Monday, the ceremony is to be moved outdoors to Democracy Boulevard, outside the eponymous blue-and-white memorial
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) supports peaceful unification with China, and President William Lai (賴清德) is “a bit naive” for being a “practical worker for Taiwanese independence,” former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in an interview published yesterday. Asked about whether the KMT is on the same page as the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on the issue of Taiwanese independence or unification with China, Ma told the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily that they are not. While the KMT supports peaceful unification and is against unification by force, the DPP opposes unification as such and
CASES SLOWING: Although weekly COVID-19 cases are rising, the growth rate has been falling, from 90 percent to 30 percent, 14 percent and 6 percent, the CDC said COVID-19 hospitalizations last week rose 6 percent to 987, while deaths soared 55 percent to 99, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, adding that the recent wave of infections would likely peak this week. People aged 65 or older accounted for 79 percent of the hospitalizations and 90 percent of the deaths, the majority of whom have or had underlying health conditions, CDC data showed. The youngest hospitalized case last week was a six-month-old, who was born preterm and was unvaccinated, CDC physician Lin Yung-ching (林詠青) said. The infant had a fever, coughing and a runny nose early this month, but