Organ transplant procedures down 61 percent in Brazil

The Covid-19 pandemic has forced transplant procedures down in 2020, as related deaths increased. Between April and June this year, as organ and tissue transplants dropped 61 percent compared to 2019, the deaths of patients registered in transplant waiting-lines skyrocketed 44.5 percent, according to the Brazilian Transplant Association (ABTO). 

The organization says that heart, liver, pancreas, lung, kidney, cornea, and marrow transplants are the most affected by the drop in donors. The numbers are already a concern to experts, who express that if the country keeps this pace, the lack of transplants and deaths associated with it would take the country back to levels last seen nine years ago.

The number of effective donors – whose organs had the donation authorized by the family after the patient’s brain death – also saw a reduction: if in June 2019 the result was of almost 17 million donors per 1 million inhabitants, the figure now shows a 6.5 percent fall, with only 15.8 donors per million.

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