It took far too long, but finally, patients needing life-saving organ transplants may end up getting the high-quality care they both need and deserve. As a disability advocate and mother of a young child with cystic fibrosis, I applaud this latest reform. Cystic fibrosis is a disease that can destroy an individual’s lungs, and sadly, many fighting for their lives die while waiting for a transplant.
Yet a recent step toward protecting the life of the vulnerable came with the congressional passage of legislation reforming the network that administers the nation’s organ transplant system. Coupled with prior reforms enacted by the Trump administration, the changes will increase the number of transplants performed every year, saving thousands of lives — not to mention taxpayer dollars.
The legislation, which passed the House and Senate on voice votes recently, would break up the monopoly held by the Organ Transplant and Procurement Network. This network, which oversees the nation’s 56 organ procurement organizations, has long suffered from archaic computer systems and an unaccountable bureaucracy.
A Senate Finance Committee investigation released last year found serious problems within the network, which ignored numerous patient complaints. Other patients suffered harm when the network’s systems lost organs awaiting transplant.
Earlier this year, the Biden administration requested new authority from Congress to restructure the organ transplant network and bids from contractors to administer its systems. Once Biden signs this legislation into law, the network can undergo the modernization that the U.S. Digital Service previously recommended.
Congress’s action comes on the heels of prior regulatory steps that also
