Monday, 15th September 2014
People to people contact is perhaps the best way to build relations between countries and this was emphasised when a Chinese boy who had received an eye cornea from a Sri Lankan, met the family in an emotional exchange on Friday.
In April 2011, Saman Amerasena died in an accident when he slipped and fell in his home. The family rushed him to hospital but was informed by doctors he would not recover. He was only 47 years.
“I was devastated. In Sri Lanka it is common to donate organs once a person is dead but we had not signed up for any such program. However, the doctors at the hospital encouraged me to donate my husband’s eyes and so I agreed,” said his wife Sandya Amarasena. In doing so she gave sight to a six-year-old Chinese boy, Xu Pengfei who damaged an eye while playing at school. Three years later, he arrived in Sri Lanka to personally thank the family. Sri Lanka is among the largest cornea providers in the world.
The cultural background of the country has helped eye donation thrive. The Buddhist concept of Dana or giving, has been the root cause of its success, in a country whose population is 75 percent Buddhist.
Hindus and Christians have also donated eyes under the cultural concept of giving. In fact, the island of 20 million people is home to the first organisation in the world that supplies or transplants corneas free of charge to the public. Since its establishment in 1958, thousands of Sri Lankans have donated eyes that have been distributed to over 57 countries. Sri Lanka also has a National Eye and Tissue Bank, which is one of the largest in the world where corneas are kept in storage before being shipped around the globe.
Over the last few years, around 1,500 corneas has been flown to China for transplant, helping strengthen ties between the two countries in the process. “I felt like my husband was looking at me when this boy walked into the house,” said an emotional Sandya Amarasena.
To mark the occasion, both she and her two daughters signed a document pledging to donate their eyes upon their deaths.
It is estimated that over a million people in Sri Lanka have made similar pledges to provide eyes to the world.
Courtesy: Xinhua
From : http://www.dailynews.lk/?q=local/chinese-boy-who-received-lankan-eyes-emotional-meeting-donor-family
