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“It’s very different from last year. Summer was a real turning point,” Landsberg said.

Another five kidney transplants at St. Paul’s this year involved living donors.

Currently, 634 people are on waiting lists for transplants in B.C.

When people who die aren’t registered as donors, their family members may be asked to consent. Landsberg said most have agreed.

“Consent to organ donation by families hasn’t been a problem. It would be unusual for families to deny consent. They look at this like, at least something good is happening.”

In December, the last month for which overdose death statistics are available, 142 B.C. residents died of overdoses. Only a small proportion of them end up being organ donors. If they die outside a hospital, they have to be resuscitated and taken to the intensive care unit of a transplant hospital — Vancouver General or St. Paul’s for adults, or B.C. Children’s Hospital.

Even if they are registered donors or their family members consent to donation after brain or cardiac death, their organs must be in good shape and then be tested to show there is minimal risk of transmitting infectious diseases like HIV, hepatitis B or hepatitis C.

Organs from donors who have died as a result of an overdose aren’t treated differently as “these drugs typically clear by the time the organs are transplanted,” according to Tina Robinson, manager of communications for B.C. Transplant.

While organ recipients are cautioned that risks may still occur even after screening, the majority of recipients accept the risks, especially if they are waiting for life-saving hearts or lungs.

Landsberg said although the latest screening technology has given some experts enough confidence to say they would even accept a donor “with a needle in their arm,” informed consent remains a careful, thorough process.

In the past two years, about 850 transplants have been done in B.C. and Landsberg said there have not been any cases of HIV, hepatitis B or hepatitis C transmission from donors to recipients.