The health minister said on Monday that he wants to build on a Bill moved by an Opposition MP to facilitate organ donation by making organ retrieval possible when a patient has 'circulatory death'.

At present organs can only be retrieved once patients are certified as being brain dead.

Minister Jo Etienne Abela said in parliament that he wanted to go beyond that so that organs could be retrieved when a patient had 'circulatory death'.

(That would mean that organs may be taken when a patient's circulatory and respiratory functions have stopped, and death is pronounced by a physician.)

The minister pointed out that this had already been introduced in other countries, such as the UK, and had led to an increase in organ donations. 

It was also for this reason, among others, that the hospital's Emergency and Intensive Care departments needed to be enlarged. 

The minister was replying to questions by Labour MP Rosianne Cutajar.

He recalled that in October he had backed a bill tabled by Nationalist MP Ivan Bartolo introducing an 'opt-out' system for organ donations.  

At present, people wishing to donate their organs need to ‘opt-in’ by registering to donate their organs for transplant once they die. Bartolo had proposed to reverse the process so that anyone over 16 would be presumed to have given consent to donating organs unless stated otherwise.

Abela said he not only backed but had also seconded Bartolo's bill, but he wanted to go further.