Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (SP)
Udupi, Feb 1: In a first of its kind initiative in the country, driving licences in Udupi district will now have organ donation status of the license holder. The initiative, wherein a person applying for licence can volunteer for organ donation, has been taken in a bid to make Udupi a district of organ donors.
"Those applying for driving licences henceforth in the district will be shown a short film of 15 minutes duration at the office of the regional transport officer, impressing on the virtues of donating one's organs. The applicant, after viewing the film, can decide about exercising the option to donate his organs like heart, pancreas, kidneys, lungs, and corneas. The driving licences will have an additional column which mentions whether the holder is a organ donor or not. This will be the first ever such initiative in the entire country," said deputy commissioner of the district, Dr Vishal R.
He said that each person can help to save seven lives of or help seven persons to live a healthy life by opting to donate his or her organs. These organs can be transplanted either by way of live transplants or cadaver transplants, both of which are highly needed, he explained.
The deputy commissioner explained that in Spain, permission to harvest organs is automatically vested. "Sri Lanka has the highest donors of cornea but the government there has banned lending of corneas outside Sri Lanka. Karnataka too is coming up with restrictions on supplying body organs outside the state," he stated. He added that this initiative targets to turn this district into organ donors' district.
KMC Manipal medical superintendent, Dr K Dayananda, said that donation of organs is a noble charity as each donor can help save several lives, which in turn, will bring happiness to their families. He urged the executive, legislature, and judiciary to play positive role towards promoting organ donations through awareness programmes and by simplifying procedures. He explained that his hospital has set up a committee on brain dead persons including neurosurgeon, doctor, anesthetist and counsellors.
District superintendent of police, Annamalai, also noted the importance on organ donation, and sought a change in the attitude of the people towards this novel cause. He also thought that there is a need to set up proper data base as the process involved is cumbersome. Director operations, Gift Your Organ Foundation from Bengaluru, Priyanka Shylendra, said that about 50,000 people from the country are awaiting heart donors while 2,000 are waiting for various organs within Karnataka. She said that in USA, 98.6 percent organ donors do so through their driving licence applications. She said that ambulance doctors, who do routine check of wallets for identification purposes, find through the driving licence card which are normally carried by everyone, that the person concerned is a organ donor.