Quadriplegic Manitoba politician wants presumed consent for organ donation
WINNIPEG — A Manitoba politician left paralyzed from the neck down by a highway collision is pushing for a law that would make all people in the province an organ donor unless they opted out.
Steven Fletcher, who has used a wheelchair since hitting a moose with his vehicle in 1996, said in an interview he remembers being close to death in hospital, unable to talk, and not having registered as an organ donor.
“Organ donation would have been consistent with my wishes, and to think that my organs, if I had passed on, would have been wasted is not a very good thought,” he said.
Fletcher is to introduce a private member’s bill in the legislature Thursday that would change the way the province registers organ donors. Currently, people opt in as donors by signing up on a provincial website or on certain provincial identity cards.