Ex-official says virus hasn't halted organ donations

Organ donations in China have kept rising in general since 2010 — the year when China started to pilot organ donations — largely due to increasing public awareness.

Last year, more than 5,800 people donated organs upon their deaths in China, compared with 34 in 2010. More than 27,000 people had donated organs between 2010 and last year, according to China Organ Transplantation Development Foundation.

China now ranks first in Asia in both the number of organ donors and transplant surgeries completed each year, and it may become No 1 in the world in both figures in two to three years, Huang said.