No space for the poor in Jeevandan scheme

HYDERABAD: There is now a raging class debate with regard to the Jeevandan scheme, given that most beneficiaries undergoing transplants using donated organs are doing so at mind-boggling costs in city corporate hospitals. The transplant can cost upwards of Rs 30 lakh, a sum not within reach of the common man.

Records of liver transplants available with the Jeevandan authorities show that since the inception of the scheme in 2013, as many as 162 liver transplants were performed in city hospitals. Of these, only three beneficiaries were from the Below Poverty Line (BPL) category, that too courtesy Rs 10.5 lakh each from the CM's relief fund,

"There are 10 more patients lined up for transplants at OGH after we performed the first successful liver transplant on a critically-ill patient from Kadapa with the CM's relief fund. But we are helpless as almost all the harvested livers under Jeevandan are cornered by corporate hospitals for patients who can shell out Rs 30-50 lakh," complained a senior government doctor at the Osmania General Hospital on condition of anonymity.

At Nims hospital too, sources say, there are BPL patients suffering from life-threatening liver diseases endlessly waiting for a transplant.

The class divide in Jeevandan has come under spotlight a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi stressed on the need for organ donation and highlighted how a poor hawker's wife got a transplant done at the GB Pant Hospital in his latest 'Mann Ki Baat' on Sunday.

But under the existing rules, it is unlikely that more number of poor patients will get liver transplants under Jeevandan. This is because the hospital which gets a cadaver donor (brain dead patient) gets the first right to claim the donated liver for its in-house patients. Only in case the hospital does not have a patient waiting for transplant does the donated liver go to the general pool, from where it is given on rotation basis to one of the 10 hospitals, including Nims and OGH.

"Unfortunately, both Nims and OGH are not able to get their in-house brain dead patients to benefit those waiting for liver transplants due to several reasons. Hence, there is a need for policy change so that liver transplants should be taken up alternatively in private and government hospitals - one patient at a time," said Dr G Swarnalatha, Jeevandan coordinator.

Jeevandan authorities have a registered a waiting list of 663 patients, most of them waiting for over a year to undergo liver transplants.

QUOTE

There are 10 more patients lined up for transplants at OGH after we performed the first successful liver transplant on a critically-ill patient from Kadapa with the CM's relief fund. But we are helpless as almost all the harvested livers under Jeevandan are cornered by corporate hospitals for patients who can shell out Rs 30-50 lakh - Senior OGH doctor