By Bae Ji-sook
Staff Reporter

The number of people dying due to their inability to get an organ transplant is increasing every year due to a chronic supply shortage, leading some to turn to illegal trading online, which raises serious ethical issues.

According the National Medical Center, the number of people waiting for transplants reached 16,994 in August, compared with 15,898 in 2007.

A total of 989 people died that year due to the lack of donors, up from 840 in 2006. In the eight months to August this year, the figure stood at 492.

Kidney transplants are most in demand with 7,188 in need of an operation, followed by bone marrow at 3,485, corneas at 3,551, and livers, 2,325.

Because of the lack of donors it takes considerable time to have the transplant operation ― an average of three years and 11 months, while over the past five years the number waiting more than three years rose by 53 percent.

Against this background, some people are looking to illegal brokers trading in human organs ― more than 3,000 illegal trades were detected between 2007 to Sept. 2008.

Last year, police found 11 online communities promoting the domestic trade of organs, and though it is illegal, transactions are showing no sighs of decreasing.

Rep. Lim Doo-sung of the governing Grand National Party and Rep. Jeon Hyun-heui of the major opposition Democratic Party said the government needs to propose measures to ease organ shortages.

Lim said the number of families ignoring the organ donation pledges of deceased family members is increasing and the government needs to try to counter this. The number of registered donors is falling after it hit a peak in 2006 with 135,413, but actual donations made were a mere 148 over the past three years. In 2007, 19 families refused to honor the pledges ― this year the number jumped to 23 as of August.

``In Spain, about 34 percent of those diagnosed as brain dead donate their organs, but here, only 3 percent do so. We need constant promotion and persuasion of their families,'' he said.

Jeon said the government should consider adopting coordinator or agent systems. ``We need to study organizations such as these in the United States managing the whole process from dealing with the declaration of brain death to the transplant procedure,'' she said.

bjs@koreatimes.co.kr