Cross-Border Quest: The Reality and Legality of Transplant Tourism

Table 2

Definition and prohibition of transplant tourism.

---

World Health Assembly Resolution 57.18—Human organ and tissue transplantation

---

“The Fifty-seventh World Health Assembly […] urges Member States […] to take measures to protect the poorest and vulnerable groups from “transplant tourism” and the sale of tissues and organs, including attention to the wider problem of international trafficking in human tissues and organs”;

---

The Declaration of Istanbul on Organ Trafficking and Transplant Tourism

---

Definition

“ Travel for transplantation is the movement of organs, donors, recipients or transplant professionals across jurisdictional borders for transplantation purposes. Travel for transplantation becomes transplant tourism if it involves organ trafficking and/or transplant commercialism or if the resources (organs, professionals and transplant centers) devoted to providing transplants to patients from outside a country undermine the country’s ability to provide transplant services for its own population.”

---

Principle 6

“Organ trafficking and transplant tourism violate the principles of equity, justice and respect for human dignity and should be prohibited.”

---