With a population of 100 million, 10 donors a year in Vietnam is equal to 0.1 percent per 1 million people, the lowest level in the world.

The figure is 11 in South Korea, which has the highest organ donor rate in Asia. However, this figure is lower than that of Spain (50), the highest rate in the world, and the US (49).

The information was released by Associate Prof Dr Dong Van He, director of the National Coordinating Center for Human Organ Transplantation, on the sidelines of the establishment of an association calling for organ donations at the Vietnam-Germany Friendship Hospital.

As many as 107 brain-dead people have had their organs donated so far at the hospital, which accounts for 70 percent of the number of brain-dead organ donors in the country.

Organ and tissue transplantation is an important achievement of the health sector in treating diseases, especially chronic and dangerous diseases that are caused by irreversible and impaired tissue and organ functions such as chronic kidney and liver disease, heart failure, bone marrow failure, and corneal failure.

The successsul organ transplantation surgeries from brain-dead donors opened up opportunities to save the lives of many patients and enhance organ transplant development in Vietnam’s health sector.

Associate Prof Dr Nguyen Thi Kim Tien, chair of the Vietnam Organ and Tissue Donation Association, who attended the event, said that the braid-dead and deceased organ donation rate in Vietnam is the lowest in the world, which is in contrast to the situation in other countries.

Tien, a former Minister of Health, said that Vietnam’s organ transplant technology is as good as the technologies in developed countries. “We are good at technology and transplant techniques, but the sources of donated organs after brain death remain small,” Tien said. 

As of early October 2023, after 31 years of organ transplants, about 8,000 transplant cases have been carried out in Vietnam. However, only six percent of the cases were transplanted with organs from brain-dead or heart-dead people (500 cases).

Twenty-five organ transplant centers operate in Vietnam, with 25 percent of organ transplant cases conducted at the Vietnam-Germany Friendship Hospital, about 300 cases there each year.

To date, 78,000 individuals have registered to donate their tissues and organs after their death or brain death.

Vo Thu