DHAKA, April 3, 2023 (BSS) - Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina today said Bangladesh has achieved the capacity in conducting critical medical surgeries including kidney transplantation.

"Bangladesh has gained huge progress in medical treatment. It has now become capable to carry out many critical operations including kidney transplant," she noted during an interaction with a Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University (BSMMU) delegation at her official Ganabhaban residence here.

BSMMU vice-Chancellor Professor Dr Md Sharfuddin Ahmed led the delegation which paid a courtesy call on her at Ganabhaban, the premier’s Deputy Press Secretary KM Shakhawat Moon briefed newsmen after the meeting.

According to Moon, the premier said her government has reached healthcare services to every doorstep following the footstep of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

She said her government has given topmost priority on extending healthcare services to the people.

Concerned physicians, kidney transplanted patients Shamima Akhter and Shabnam Sultana and mother of Kidney donor Sara Islam were present, among others.

Earlier on January 19 last, a team of physicians at BSMMU Hospital led by Prof Dr Habibur Rahman Dulal successfully transplanted kidneys collected from a clinically dead person to two patients.

It was the first cadaveric kidney transplant performed in the country.

They took the kidneys from Sara Islam, a 20-year-old patient who was at the intensive care unit and declared clinically dead on January 18 afternoon.

The kidneys were collected after Sara's mother gave her consent for the operation.

Kidney transplantation from living donors began in Bangladesh in 1982. But taking a kidney from a clinically dead patient was restricted legally.

In 2018, the organ donation law was amended allowing collection of organs from the clinically dead with consent from concerned relatives.