A proposal for posthumous donation of skin and human tissues has sparked debate in Egypt following parliamentary calls for a national tissue bank to provide treatment options for severe burns. The proposal seeks to reduce reliance on imported tissue, which can cost around EGP 1 million—approximately US$21,000 at the exchange rate cited in the Arabic report—for a single case.
Although Organ Transplantation Law No. 5 of 2010 was adopted and amended in 2017, and Article 61 of Egypt’s constitution describes organ and tissue donation as a “gift of life” whose rules the state must regulate, the absence of operating mechanisms and donation banks has obstructed implementation of these legal and constitutional provisions.
Rights lawyer Malek Adly, director of the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights, attributes this failure to the lack of a functioning administrative and technical structure, despite implementing regulations being issued in 2011. He says the system still lacks donation banks, unified registers of posthumous donors, clear procedures for handling bodies and rules for prioritising transplants. Sixteen years after the law was adopted, this framework has not been built, he argues.
Adly told Zawia3 that scientific advances require transplant legislation to keep pace with preservation techniques, donation, digitisation and data management to ensure control and transparency. He said there was no publicly announced means for citizens to register their wish to donate organs after death.
He believes this goes beyond an organisational shortcoming, exposing a gap between law and practice and institutional delay over the right to health. New legislative discussions reveal a chronic healthcare problem, he says, asking why a law in force since 2010 remains without effective implementation or serious review in 2026 in an area affecting the rights to life and health.
This gap prompted Senator Amira Saber Kandil to submit a proposal to the health and population minister for a national human tissue bank and simpler posthumous donation procedures. It envisages a pilot project at a specialised hospital and a national donor register, reducing imports, providing lifesaving treatment and saving millions of pounds annually.
Kandil told Zawia3 that tissue banks are an established international model. Tissue donation is a medical necessity to save lives, rather than a cosmetic luxury, she said. She described children with burns exceeding 50% of body surface as a major group among fatal third-degree burn cases in Egypt, requiring human skin grafts that can cost approximately EGP 1 million per case to import. These are her account of patients’ needs and estimated costs.
Her proposal encompasses different tissues, including corneas and heart valves. She sees broadening the discussion as a step towards ensuring the right to treatment and says Egypt’s lack of tissue banks, sixteen years after the transplant law, requires renewed legislative and practical debate.
The senator is conducting a legislative impact assessment of Law No. 5 of 2010 to evaluate implementation, identify shortcomings and determine changes needed in documentation and donation procedures. The absence of a unified national donor register, she says, prevents donors’ wishes from being carried out after death or linked to hospitals.
Kandil holds the Health Ministry responsible for the absence of a national tissue bank, calling it an institutional failure. A bank must be supervised and monitored by the ministry, with parliamentary oversight to ensure transparency and prevent exploitation, she says. Donor data should be protected through cybersecurity measures and a strict governance system.
Implementation Gaps and Burn Patients’ Needs
Gaps in implementing the transplant law and the absence of tissue banks impeded access to human skin for patients at the specialised Ahl Masr burn hospital over two years. With no local supply, board chair Heba El-Sewedy asked Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly to coordinate with the Egyptian Drug Authority to ensure imported shipments cleared customs and reached the hospital within 24 hours. According to the report, this arrangement began in November 2025.
Skin grafting transfers skin to cover severe burns. Donated skin can serve as a temporary covering while the patient stabilises and their own skin can be used for grafting. The report describes posthumous skin donation as taking a very thin surface layer from less visible areas such as the back or thighs, with preservation through techniques including freezing or glycerol. The procedure and arrangements for the body depend on the medical and donation protocol.
El-Sewedy told Zawia3 that posthumously donated human skin is used as a temporary treatment for burn patients who have lost extensive skin coverage. It covers damaged areas until the patient stabilises or grafting using their own skin becomes possible, playing a critical role in improving survival.
Skin is the body’s first line of defence: it regulates temperature, prevents fluid loss and reduces infection risk, she explained. Severe burns remove those protections and can quickly create life-threatening risks. She said grafting with the patient’s own skin is feasible where sufficient unaffected skin remains, and described donated skin as particularly necessary for children with burns above 30% and adults above 40% of body surface. These thresholds are her description of the hospital’s patients, rather than a universal treatment rule.
“We are the first hospital in Egypt to import natural skin from internationally accredited tissue banks in the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. It was preserved and transported at temperatures as low as minus 80 degrees Celsius,” El-Sewedy said. “This unprecedented step aimed to save critical cases with no other treatment alternatives. We performed ten natural-skin graft operations free of charge for critically ill children and adults. One can cost approximately EGP 1 million and reach EGP 3.6 million.”
She believes a national skin and tissue bank would transform treatment by enabling faster intervention, lowering costs and improving survival: a long-term humanitarian investment in saving lives.
The World Health Organization estimates that burns cause around 180,000 deaths worldwide each year, predominantly in low- and middle-income countries. Many children who survive experience temporary or permanent disabilities. Scalding from hot liquids is a major cause of childhood burns, often occurring at home. Adult injuries include fire, electrical burns and industrial accidents. Poverty, crowding and limited first-aid awareness increase risks.
The report cites Central Agency for Public Mobilisation and Statistics figures of 51,029 fires in Egypt in 2025, up 8.7% from 46,925 in 2024. They caused 180 recorded deaths, down 22.4% from 232, and 738 injuries, down 11.2% from 831. Cigarette ends and matches accounted for 31.3% of incidents and electrical short circuits for 17.9%.
Separately, Ahl Masr estimates approximately 250,000 burn cases annually in Egypt and says more than 37% die within the first six hours because of inadequate specialised care and skin coverage, rising to around 60% after days because of infection, dehydration and malnutrition. These are estimates attributed to the hospital. The official fire-incident figures and the hospital’s broader burn estimates concern different measures and cannot be read as the same national dataset.
Patients also face a shortage of intensive-care beds in burn departments. The report says there were only 72 in 2022, before the Health Ministry announced an increase to 140 in 2023 and an increase in inpatient burn beds from 518 to 555. There are also few specialised government facilities: six hospitals and 51 burn centres and units across the governorates.
Hospital management consultant Hussein Othman sees a substantial gap between burn patients’ needs and available human skin and tissues. He places it within the wider neglected issue of organ donation, despite its direct role in saving lives.
Alongside the lack of local donation procedures, he identifies limited public understanding of donation and medical misconceptions. Many people fear disfiguring a body or compromising the deceased’s dignity. Othman emphasises that donation takes a superficial layer of skin rather than removing the full skin covering, and that one donor may help several severely burned patients.
“The absence of a national tissue bank has affected burn patients’ chances of survival. There are no precise figures for deaths associated with a skin shortage,” he told Zawia3. He cited the estimate of 250,000 annual burn injuries and said survival becomes harder above 30% body-surface burns, while skin grafting can improve it to more than 60%. Those figures are his assessment; the article does not provide a study denominator or a universal prognosis for individual patients.
Othman notes that some countries operate presumed-consent systems for posthumous tissue donation, while others require prior consent. In both models, tissues, particularly skin, are scientifically preserved for patient treatment. Importing human skin imposes costs and drains foreign currency, he says, while enabling local donation and establishing national organ and tissue banks could conserve resources and save thousands of burn patients annually.
A Ministry Plan, but No Separate Bank Announcement
After the parliamentary proposal generated public debate, local newspapers reported that the Health Ministry had been planning an organ and tissue bank for more than two years as part of the development of Nasser Institute and Nile Medical City. Reports described databases, a comprehensive organisational framework for tissues such as corneas and skin, electronic donor registration and precise medical protocols to ensure transparency and oversight.
Zawia3 asked Health Ministry spokesperson Dr Hossam Abdel Ghaffar about those reports. He said the ministry had not announced a separate skin and tissue bank. His television remarks, circulated by media outlets, concerned redevelopment of Nasser Institute. Any tissue or organ-transplant component falls within the general timetable of ongoing institute projects and a broader future plan to establish the Middle East’s largest transplant centre at Nile Medical City, he said.
Abdel Ghaffar stressed that a health project depends on personnel before infrastructure. Any new system requires staff capable of performing its specified functions, making workforce capacity central to planning future ministry expansion.
He added that the ministry had signed a cooperation protocol with Spain’s Health Ministry in recent weeks, citing Spain’s leading position in transplants from deceased donors. The partnership involves capacity building and developing the transplant system to support Egypt’s efforts sustainably.
Asked why tissue transplantation remained delayed more than fifteen years after the law was adopted, he replied: “The issue only gained sufficient momentum recently. The ministry has been working on this pathway for about two years, before the latest parliamentary and media debate intensified.”
The debate over skin and tissue donation thus reveals a problem deeper than public misunderstanding: a longstanding gap between legislation and implementation in an area directly affecting the right to life. Between a law adopted sixteen years ago and limited medical initiatives saving lives through exceptional efforts, the absence of a national tissue bank exposes institutional delay and its human and economic cost.
The report argues that the central question is no longer whether a tissue bank would be useful, but what continued delay costs. It calls for a transparent, governed system enabling rapid intervention and fair access to treatment, rather than a reality that wastes resources and leaves lives at risk.
