The parents of a Dublin man who died last week while waiting for a life-saving transplant have urged people not to allow the organ retention controversy discourage them from becoming donors.
Mr Rory O'Connor (31) died after a nine-month wait for a double lung transplant at Newcastle's Freeman Hospital.
His father, Mr Tom O'Connor, from Malahide, said if it wasn't for a recent fall-off in organ donations "I think my son would be alive today".
Last May, he said, when they visited the hospital - which carries out lung transplants on Irish patients as no such facility yet exists here - "we were given to believe there would be a very good chance he would be done before Christmas.
"There are normally six to seven transplants a month. This was down to one each in November and December, three in January and I don't think there were any last month."
Mr O'Connor, a cystic fibrosis sufferer, had been living in Belfast for the past decade, where he graduated from the University of Ulster Art College and ran his own postcard advertising business. In January 2000 his condition deteriorated and he was treated at Belfast City Hospital.
Two weeks ago, he agreed to participate in an awareness-raising effort at the hospital aimed at encouraging more people to carry organ donor cards.
"He really thought he was going to be transplanted," said Mr O'Connor's mother, Rose. "Death never entered his mind."
She urged people not to be discouraged from donating organs, and suggested it might be better to have a donor "opt-out" policy in the Republic, like that in other countries, rather than an "optin" one.
"I can understand people's upset over the organ retention controversy but if it's explained to people exactly what the procedures are in transplants I don't think you'll have such a problem getting consent."
She added: "It would be great if some good were to come out of Rory's death if it perhaps encouraged more people to become donors and maybe save a life."
Their pleas come ahead of the Irish Kidney Association's Donor Awareness Week, which starts on March 31st next.
The association has recorded an alarming rise recently in the number of cases where a request for life-saving organs was refused by next-of-kin. There were 25 such refusals last year compared to 10 in 1999 and nine in 1998.
"The last time we had this type of blip was when the blood scandals developed and there was an apathy towards donation," said Mr Mark Murphy, acting chief executive of the association. "This time it seems to stem from a confusion between organ retention and organs taken for transplant when, in fact, they are totally different things. One occurs through post-mortem and the other through an operation or surgery."
Weblink: www.ika.ie
