IN BRIEF (Page 22)

Green light for human organ donation sites

Two more Chinese localities are to pilot a human organ donation regulation that allows relatives of a deceased person to decide whether to donate their organs, Xinhua News Agency reported. The Human Body Donation Regulation was enacted by local legislatures in East China's Jiangxi province and North China's Tianjin municipality at their annual sessions last month. "This is good news for more than 1.5 million Chinese patients waiting for organ donations and transplants to cure their diseases," said Dai Ying, secretary-general of the Jiangxi branch of the Red Cross Society of China. Statistics from the Ministry of Health showed that only around 10,000 patients can have organ transplants performed annually due to a lack of donors. Jiangxi and Tianjin were among 10 provinces and municipalities approved by the Ministry of Health in March 2010 to pilot the regulation. The regulation is seen as a crucial attempt to raise public awareness of the importance of organ donation and to curb rampant black market dealing, which Dai said could be more lucrative than drug trafficking.

SOEs show increased social responsibility