Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps the Government is taking to prevent British citizens from receiving organs overseas from the forced organ harvesting trade.

The Government supports the establishment of lawful and ethical organ donation and transplantation programmes to address the world-wide shortage of organs for transplant and a range of action to discourage organ trafficking, transplant tourism and commercialism. The United Kingdom formally signed the Council of Europe Convention Against Trafficking in Human Organs on 25 March 2015 and has laws and protocols in place to ensure well-regulated practice to prevent organ trafficking in the UK.

The Government supports the Declaration of Istanbul, which encourages all countries to draw up legal and professional frameworks to govern organ donation and transplantation activities. We have also participated in the development of the World Health Organization Guiding Principles to ensure that human material removed from deceased and living donors for the purpose of transplantation only takes place according to agreed ethical principles.

Patients receiving transplants outside the UK will be subject to the relevant regulatory regime in place and should be aware of the risks, including possible prosecution for non-compliance with relevant local and international provisions, poor donor care, poorer graft survival, infection and in extreme cases, death.