SIGNIFICANT CHANGES ARE BEING MADE IN JAPAN AS LOWER HOUSE ON THURSDAY, JUNE 18 APPROVED A HIGHLY CONTROVERSIAL ORGAN TRANSPLANT AMENDMENT BILL.According to the previous law, only people aged 15 or older were allowed to receive transplants, brain death was not recognized as legal death, and organ transplantation was only possible if the potential donor had declared their intention to donate organs while alive.
The new amended bill recognizes brain death as legal death, does not put an age limit for organ transplants and allows family members to chose if the organs of a relative can be used for organ transplantations unless the propsective donor had clearly said no before his/her death.
The new law is intended to ease the burden on families with children that need organ transplantations and so far had to go abroad to receive them. Further, lawmakers also hope to increase the overall number of organ transplantations from only 81 since the enactment of the original bill in 1997.
Yet the amendment is highly controversial. There are also doubts as to the extent of the understanding by lawmakers about the details of the bill including possible ethical consequences before voting.
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