China's first online volunteer organ donor registry will be launched this month to help ease the shortage of organs for transplant, the Red Cross Society of China has announced.

The registry will play an important role in spreading the message that organ donations save lives, said Gao Xinpu, a division director of the society's National Organ Donation Management Center, adding that "being registered as a volunteer is not a guarantee that you can be a donor".

The organ donor registry in the United States has 129 million names, about 40 percent of the population.

According to China's National Health and Family Planning Commission, each year the country has 300,000 patients in need of life-saving organ transplants, but only 10,000 get one. By contrast, the ratio in the US is one in four, Gao said.

China launched an organ donation system in 2010 after a trial run in 16 areas. It later expanded into 19 areas, and will cover another six locations in June, said Liu Weixin, deputy director of center.

Training programs will be held for organ donation coordinators across the country, he said, while "a regulation to license, register and supervise coordinators will also be issued by the center this month".

After the system run jointly by the National Health and Family Planning Commission and the Red Cross Society of China was introduced, officials said the number of donations from the public has increased significantly.

The system so far covers 19 provinces and municipalities and has handled almost 800 donations, involving more than 2,100 organs such as livers and kidneys, said Gao.

(China Daily Africa Weekly 06/21/2013 page31)