By Kim Rahn
A law designed to prevent organ trade is preventing urgent organ transplants, with a North Korean defector not receiving a transplant even after finding a donor.
The 46-year-old defector, identified as Hong, came to South Korea in October, 2004. After two years of working at a restaurant, she worked at a hospital after passing a nurse’s aide exam.
Hong, who had suffered hepatitis B from her stay in the North, developed cirrhosis last August. Doctors said last month that she had also developed cancer, but she had no family here for a live partial-liver donation.
She wrote about her situation on an Internet community for defectors, and a man surnamed Bae told her that he would donate part of his liver. Hong submitted related documents for an organ transplant to the National Cancer Center and the Korean Network for Organ Sharing (KONOS).
The center accepted the documents, but KONOS turned it down, asking her to submit additional documents to prove the donation was not for monetary purposes.
The law on organ transplantation bans organ trade and thus demands documents or material to attest to such if the donor and the patient are not related by blood.
“Except for donation between family members, the patient should prove the donation is made for health reasons. For example, if the donor and the patient were schoolmates at college, they can present a graduation photo album as evidence. We are sorry for Hong, but it is a measure to prevent organ trade, which is applied not only to defectors but everyone,” a staffer at KONOS said.
But Hong had nothing to prove her friendship with Bae, who she met through the online community. With her condition getting worse, she lost conscious on May 16 and came around on May 20 after hospitalization at an intensive care unit.
A Catholic priest offered to become their legal guarantor and sent a handwritten document to prove Hong and Bae’s “pure” relationship to KONOS Monday. KONOS will review the paper and decide within 10 days whether to accept it or demand she submit more supplementary documents.
“We know the specific situation of a North Korean defector and would like to help, but we also should follow legal procedures,” the KONOS staffer said.
She also pointed out the specific way Hong searched for a donor — open and through the Internet — which the institution avoids for fear of organ trade. “If we accept Hong’s case, other patients waiting for organ transplantation will come in flocks after finding donors through the Internet, and such donors are likely to aim for financial gains in return,” she said.
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