Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Hansard source

I very much welcome the introduction of the Australian Organ and Tissue Donation and Transplantation Authority Bill 2008. There are currently more than 1,700 Australians waiting for an organ donation and, for many of them, the prospect of receiving an organ means not just improved quality of life but also the prospect of life itself. The possibility of a transplant offers hope, but, all too often, time runs out. We need to make sure that hope is realised as often as possible. Many of us will know someone who could benefit from organ donation. We know how they have lived their lives; we know what they have given to their families and their communities. My former electorate council chairman currently sits at home on oxygen and waits and waits and waits for a transplant. With that transplant she would be able to lead a normal life. She would be able to resume her very wide-ranging activities in the community. But for the moment it is a waiting game, and the wait seems to go on and on. I am hopeful that this bill may mean that the wait for others may be far shorter than for my former electorate council chairman.

We have improving surgical techniques which are allowing us to save lives, and it seems cruel that many people are losing their lives purely through the lack of a donor. There will always be an element of chance in organ donation, in relying on the right donor to become available at the right time, and clearly we need to make every effort to ensure that donors and recipients are matched in an efficient manner. We must also recognise that, while the recipient will be beginning a new life, the donor’s family will be coping with the loss of a loved one. It is only right that this bill should be about both recipients and donors’ families.

As I said, there are currently around 1,700 people waiting for an organ donation. Yet in 2007 there were just 198 donors and 657 transplants conducted. These statistics are all the more heartbreaking when one considers that Australia is a world leader in clinical outcomes for transplant patients. If you are fortunate enough to get a donated organ or tissue, Australia’s medical system offers you a better chance of long-term survival than almost any other nation in the world. It would appear from the figures provided by the Australia and New Zealand Organ Donation Registry that all donors had enrolled in the registry and had recorded their intention on their drivers licence. So, while it would seem that the system is working to the extent that it is identifying all registered donors, more donors are needed.

Australia has far fewer donors per million people than the rest of the developed world. Registering as a potential donor and encouraging people to register is obviously the best first step in trying to ensure that potential recipients are given the opportunity for a transplant. But the decision to be a potential donor is not one that should be taken alone. It is the grieving families who will be faced with the realities of that decision, not the donor. It should not, therefore, be a decision for the donor alone. It should be a decision taken with the full knowledge of the potential donor’s next of kin and with full consideration for their feelings. For some grieving families, the thought that their loved one could offer someone else the chance of life will be some consolation. For others, the thought of further damage being inflicted to the body through organ removal will be too much to bear. The more we can do to educate people about the need for organ donation and the responsibility to one’s family associated with becoming a registered donor, the better.

On the subject of donor families, one of the aspects I particularly welcome in the bill is the provision of specialists in hospitals to work with potential donors and their families. Doctors, surgeons and nurses have demanding jobs at the best of times. In most cases, authority for organ donation is sought by the intensive care clinician or the registrar. Surely it is asking too much of medical staff who have been struggling to save someone’s life to then take on the task of approaching the family for permission to remove organs. Other patients will be needing their attention. The pressure of dealing with the sick and dying is already immense without adding to it the pressure and emotion of talking to shocked and grieving family members and helping them through such a decision. It is far better to have someone who is not involved directly in the medical care of the potential donor and who has the time and training to give the family members the attention, support and information they deserve.

While there are steps we can take to try to increase the numbers of potential donors, there are also steps that we can take to try to reduce the need for transplant organs. I think that there is an obligation on all of us to do all we can to maintain healthy lifestyles and, in doing so, reduce the incidence of disease. For instance, in Australia there are more overweight or obese people than there are not, so the challenge of lifestyle factors in reducing the demand for transplant organs is one that cannot be ignored.

We also need to rethink the measures we are taking to ram home the dangers of obesity and lifestyle diseases, because the message is clearly not getting through. It is all very well to say that individuals must take responsibility for their own health, but many do not take responsibility and then the state has to foot the bill. The people who are afflicted with lifestyle related diseases are actually competing with other recipients for transplant organs. Whilst it is outside the mandate of the transplantation authority, we do need to increase our efforts to drive home that healthy lifestyle message. Success here would go some way to addressing the imbalance between the number of donors and recipients by reducing the number waiting for a transplant.

I note the number of people registering as donors is rising, but we need to make sure that the goodwill and altruism of those potential donors does not go to waste. The Howard government was working towards increasing donation rates through a number of important initiatives. Australians Donate was given the role as the peak body for organ donation in Australia from 2002. As a part of the Rudd government’s new plans for organ donation, Australians Donate was closed in March this year. The organisation was very active in using celebrities and media personalities to promote and encourage organ donation and was the driving force behind the National Organ Donor Week and the Organ Donor Registry.

As part of the efforts to lift organ donor rates the National Organ Donation Collaborative was launched in 2006 by the then Minister for Health and Ageing, Tony Abbott. The collaborative was based in part on the successful US model and it led to increases in the number of organ donations in participating hospitals. Minister Abbott also worked hard to bring the states and territories together on this issue through the Australian Health Ministers Conference. As part of this national approach to organ donation the states and territories agreed in 2005 to allow the Commonwealth to operate the Australian Organ Donor Registry as a single national registry for organ donors.

This bill will establish the Australian Organ and Tissue Donation and Transplant Authority. It will also introduce a national system for organ and tissue donation. The authority is to be the driving force behind the development of an organ donation system that is world’s best practice. I commend the government for its desire to follow best practice in this area, but, as I have learned over the past 10 months, we need to rely on what this government does, not what it says.

For the sake of those people around the country waiting for transplants I sincerely hope that the authority does achieve success in raising donation and survival rates. I note that the bill also establishes an advisory council which will provide advice to the transplant authority’s CEO about donation and transplantation matters. This advisory council is important because it is essential to get health professionals involved in this process to ensure that the programs implemented by the authority are practical.

Another important part of this strategy is the $13.4 million allocated over four years to a national education and awareness campaign. It is very important to keep the issue in the public eye and encourage people to talk about organ donation with their families. Despite the fact that 90 per cent of Australians claim to support organ donation, many people have still not sat down with their families and discussed what should happen to their organs in the event of their death. The allocation of funding to assist the families of the deceased donors is a welcome part of this bill. The loss of a loved one is always difficult and any extra support can only be welcomed by grieving families. For some families their grief will be tempered slightly by the knowledge that the death of their loved one will not be entirely in vain.

I also welcome plans for professional education programs to ensure that doctors and hospital staff are doing everything possible to maximise the number and success of transplants. The bill also provides funding to help hospitals with the costs of additional staffing, equipment and infrastructure needed for the accommodation of transplant patients. Because of the government’s proposed changes to the Medicare levy surcharge, the Treasury forecast that more people will be relying on the public health system over the next few years. This will put further strain on our state health systems which are already chronically underfunded.

It would be a shame if some hospitals were not involved in organ donation efforts to the fullest extent because of budget constraints. This federal funding for staff and infrastructure will mean that additional transplants are not an excessive burden on the budgets of participating hospitals. The coordinated approach represented by the measures in the bill, particularly the introduction of specialist staff, will, I am sure, go a long way to reducing transplant waiting lists and help provide a new start for many seriously ill Australians. There will always be more that can be done to boost organ donation rates in Australia, but this bill is a welcome development, and I join my opposition colleagues in supporting its passage through the House.

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