Written answers

Wednesday, 25 June 2025

Department of Health

Legislative Programme

Photo of Mattie McGrathMattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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180. To ask the Minister for Health to provide clarity regarding the Human Tissue (Transplantation, Post-Mortem, Anatomical Examination and Public Display) Act 2024 on who will have the authority to make the decision on whether a person is brain dead or not; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [34571/25]

Photo of Jennifer Carroll MacNeillJennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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Part 2 of the Human Tissue (Transplantation, Post-Mortem, Anatomical Examination and Public Display) Act 2024, which commenced on 17 June 2025, provides for the first time a national legislative framework for organ donation and transplantation services in Ireland.

Section 16 sets out the specific steps which must be followed ahead of donation and transplantation involving a deceased donor. This applies to all deceased donations, including following brain stem death.

Under the Act, it is for a registered medical practitioner to be satisfied, following a medical examination, that a donor is no longer alive.

According to Organ Donation Transplant Ireland, brain stem death, which is defined as the permanent loss of function of the brain stem, is ascertained through tests carried out by two senior doctors to determine absence of brain function. When these tests show that there is no brain function and no chance of recovery, the patient is declared dead.

Insofar as it is clinically appropriate, the registered medical practitioner who certifies the death of the donor will not have a primary role or responsibility in relation to:

  • the removal of the organ, tissue or cells from the donor
  • transplantation activities in respect of the donor or recipient, or
  • the medical treatment of the potential recipients.
Organs or tissues and cells will not be removed from a deceased donor unless the registered medical practitioner is satisfied that the donor is no longer alive, the relevant confirmation of no objection or consent to donation has been provided, and the coroner has signed off on the retrieval in instances of death falling under the jurisdiction of the Coroner’s Acts. Failure to comply with these measures is an offence under the Act.

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