Asingle nonprofit has what amounts to a monopoly over all organ transplants performed in the United States, but the federal government said that it plans to change that.
In 2022, a record 42,887 organ transplants were performed. Yet nearly 104,000 people remain on waiting lists for organs. About 22 people die each day while waiting, even as organs are discarded, damaged while being delivered or not collected, according to a new story published by the Washington Post.
The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), which has contracted with the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) to run the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network for 37 years, announced in March it will invite organizations to bid for contracts for different parts of the transplant system’s functions.
“Every day, patients and families across the United States rely on the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network [OPTN] to save the lives of their loved ones who experience organ failure,” HRSA Administrator Carole Johnson said in a news release announcing the change. “At HRSA, our stewardship and oversight of this vital work is a top priority. That is why we are taking action to both bring greater transparency to the system and to reform and modernize the OPTN.”
Among the plan’s many changes are steps to improve the technologies used by surgeons and transplant coordinators.
Network structure would also change, including adding a strong, independent board of directors. A new public dashboard should also make the donation and receipt process more transparent.
UNOS said in a statement it “supports HRSA’s plan to introduce additional reforms into the nation’s organ donation and transplantation system, and welcomed a competitive bidding process.”
“We believe we have the experience and expertise required to best serve the nation’s patients and to help implement HRSA’s proposed initiatives,” the statement said.
But the White House’s U.S. Digital Service called UNOS’s technological system archaic in a confidential 2021 assessment for HRSA. It also recommended breaking up UNOS’s monopoly over that technology, the Post reported.
“UNOS has allowed the organ donation system to become mismanaged, unsafe and self-enriching,” Greg Segal, founder and CEO of Organize, a nonprofit patient advocacy group, told the Post. “Today’s announcement that HHS will break up UNOS’s monopoly, and bring in competent and transparent new contractors, is a transformative and unequivocal win for patients.”
UNOS oversees a transplantation network that includes about 250 hospitals that perform transplants. Also in the network are 56 government-chartered nonprofits that collect organs and labs that test organ compatibility.