On average, Vietnamese surgeons perform every years a hundred liver transplants, 90 heart transplants, 13 lung transplants, and two small intestine transplants, among others, said the president of the Vietnamese Association for Organ and Tissue Donation, Nguyen Thi Kim Tien.

A former Health Minister, Tien disclosed the information during the launching ceremony of this entity’s branch for the southern region of the country.

At the event, the director of the Ho Chi Minh City University Hospital of Medicine and Pharmacy, Nguyen Hoang Bac, stressed that Vietnam managed to master modern organ transplant techniques, despite being late comers to this practice, compared to other countries.

“The technical and scientific level of these surgeries has made significant progress,” said the doctor, quoted by the VNA news agency, according to which Vietnam has the lowest rate of organ donation from brain-dead people in the region,

This indicator, he said, is only six percent, much lower than the 50-60 percent or even more than 90 percent in developed countries.

Of every 100 transplants in Vietnam, 96 come from live donors, while only six are from brain-dead ones.

This practice is somewhat inhibited by the cultural belief that “the body should remain intact after death,” which limits awareness of donation as a communal responsibility.

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