14:12
Tieng Anh Vui
A change in the law to bring in an opt-out organ donation system is being debated by Welsh assembly members.
Ministers want Wales to become the first UK country to adopt a system where individuals will be presumed to have consented for their organs to be donated unless they opt out.
Shadow Health Minister Darren Millar said he opposed a system where transplantation became a "passive" act.
Ministers want to increase the number of donors for transplant.
Opponents want families to be able to stop a donation if their relative did not express an opinion either way.
The debate is expected to last a couple of hours.
If passed by assembly members on Tuesday, the presumed consent system could come into force by 2015.
The Welsh government hopes legislation will lead to a rise in the numbers of donors by around 25%.
Conservative AM Mr Millar said he would be voting against the Human Transplantation Bill regardless of the way it was amended by AMs after the debate.
"I'm opposed in principle to a system where organ transplantation becomes a passive act, and consent for it is presumed, or as the Bill puts it deemed, by the state", he said.
He also called for an independent evaluation of the new system to be carried out once it was up and running, as it was possible there could be "unintended consequences" from presumed consent.
Mr Millar warned that evidence from Chile, since it had introduced such a system, showed that it could result in a fall in the number of organ donors.
As currently happens, organs could go to recipients anywhere in the UK, not just in Wales, although evidence from other countries with an opt-out system indicates that the rise is small with around 15 additional donors provided each year and approximately 45 extra organs.
ORGAN DONATION FIGURES
- The aim of the Bill is to increase the number of organs available from Wales, potentially by 25%
- On latest figures this would see the number of donors rise from around 65 donors to 80.
- The average number of transplants anticipated from 15 additional donors would be approximately 26 kidneys, 10 livers, two hearts and four lungs
- Just over 30% of organs donated in Wales are transplanted into people living in Wales
According to the NHS Blood and Transplant service, fewer than 5,000 people die every year in the UK in circumstances that would allow them to donate successfully.
Added to that, when compatibility, organ suitability, location, time scales and consent are taken into account it means that not everyone who wants to donate actually does.
It is estimated there are around 250 people on a waiting list for a transplant at any one time - 33 people in Wales died in 2012/13 whilst waiting.
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There has been opposition to the changes from Christian churches and from within the Muslim and Jewish communities.
They want a so-called "soft opt-out scheme" in the legislation to give deceased patients' families a say on donation if their relative had neither opted in or out.
The 30-strong Labour group in the assembly is being whipped to vote in favour of the Bill. Conservative and Plaid Cymru AMs have a free vote.
The Lib Dems say all five of their AMs are in favour of presumed consent.
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