Will Egyptians change their minds about organ donation?
A debate has been triggered about the legitimacy of postmortem organ donation after claims that corneas were removed from a dead patient for transplant without the family’s consent.
Top Egyptian health officials recently triggered a public row following their remarks that give the green light for the removal of deceased persons' corneas without their families' consent. This issue has rekindled a years-old broader debate over organ donation in Egypt.
The debate stemmed from a video posted on social media July 30 by an Egyptian citizen showing his dead brother with bloody eye sockets amid allegations that Kasr al-Ainy Hospital in Cairo extracted the corneas without his family’s consent. The video went viral within a few hours, coupled with many questions simmering in Egyptians’ minds regarding the potential abuse of the sacredness of the human body — especially without the family's approval.
