|
KATHMANDU, NEPAL - Nepal has expertise and infrastructure to start kidney transplantation. However, apathy of the Ministry of Health and Population has prevented the service from commencing, doctors said here at a press meet on Friday.
"We have every kind of expertise and infrastructure for kidney transplant. However, the ministry is not serious about allowing hospitals to do so," said Dr Mahesh Khakurel, director of TU Teaching Hospital (TUTH). He said a transplant costing from Rs 800,000 to Rs 1.6 million in India would be available at Rs 250,000 in Nepal.
According to Dr Khakurel, besides experts present in TUTH, Japan and Australia have assured they will share expertise if TUTH is allowed to start the service.
Dr Rishi Kumar Kafle of National Kidney Center (NKC) said that to allow hospitals in Nepal to start providing the service, the ministry should take the initiative to amend Organ Transplant Act 2055 and Kidney Transplant Regulations 2058. According to Dr Kafle, the Regulations has a provision of jail term for life with property attachment if the kidney donor dies within three month of donation. However, the Regulations does not specify who is liable to such punishment.
After the Regulations was drafted some seven years back, an Organ Transplant Coordination Committee was formed, which was supposed to issue licenses to Nepali doctors for kidney transplant. The committee also has the responsibility to decide if a hospital is capable of starting transplantation. But the committee has been non-existent for the past two years. To reconstitute the committee, the ministry should appoint four people from the ministry.
Dr Sudha Khakurel of Bir Hospital said another flaw in the Regulations is licensing system.
She said kidney transplant is a team work and therefore issuing license to one doctor does not serve the purpose. Therefore, hospitals should be authorized to choose their teams for the service.
Bir Hospital has been issued authority to conduct transplants. But the first transplant carried out by the hospital failed. Dr Sudha said the failure made resumption of transplant impossible due to public distrust. Bir has been waiting for a team of foreign experts to resume the service.
None of the doctors from around the world will carry out kidney transplant under Nepal's legal provisions, Dr Chop Lal Bhusal, chairperson of Nepal Medical Association said. He also said that nephrologists in Nepal have been receiving calls from "journalists" threatening to publish news of their (doctors') involvement in the kidney trade if they do not give them money.
"They have started blackmail after Amit Kumar was arrested. We condemn such acts," Dr Bhusal said.
According to TUTH, about 200 to 250 patients needing kidney transplant visit the hospital every year. Similarly, NKC refers about 70 patients to India for kidney transplantation every year.
| 
