For the second consecutive year, Trento is the most generous of the large Italian cities in terms of organ and tissue donation. The small village of Geraci Siculo is confirmed at the top of the ranking of small municipalities, driven by the sensitivity born after the story of Marta, a little girl who died in 2021, with the example of her parents who signed for the explant despite knowing that it was more possible for clinical reasons, causing great emotion and attention towards organ donation. While the Apulian Corato and the Abruzzese Guardiagrele stand out among the medium-sized towns. These are the results of the latest edition of the Gift Index, the report produced by the National Transplant Center which analyzes the numbers of declarations of willingness to donate organs and tissues recorded in 2022 when issuing the electronic identity card in the registers of the 7,028 Italian municipalities where the service is active.
The Index was published ahead of the 26th National Organ Donation Day which is celebrated next Sunday, April 16th. In 2022, 2.8 million new declarations of willingness to donate were registered: 1.9 million yes (68.2%) but also almost 900 thousand no (31.8%), with a slight deterioration compared to 2021 when the consents stood at 68.9%. 55.5% of the citizens who went to the registry office to request an identity card expressed themselves. In detail, the highest percentages of consent were recorded among women (71.3%, against 66.2% of yes expressed among men) and among 35-40 year olds (72.6%), while the opposition to donation is slightly higher among the very young (in 2022 30.2% of 18-25 year olds registered a no) to then grow exponentially over the age of 70 (42.4% no among 70-80 year olds, 56.5% among the over 80s) in the mistaken belief that organ donation in old age is not possible. To date, the Transplant Information System hosts 15.5 million registered declarations: 11.1 million yes and 4.4 million no.
BIG CITIES: TRENTO IS ENOUGH, SASSARI AND LIVORNO BEHIND As in the previous year, Trento is still at the top of the classification of generosity among the 44 Italian cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants. The donation index reached by the Trentino capital is 69.76/100: in 2022, out of 11,678 citizens who renewed the CIE, 65.6% chose to express their will on the donation (34.4% abstained) and among the registrants, 78.6% said yes. A high approval rate, more than 10 points above the national average which stands at 68.2%. In second place tied Sassari and Livorno, both with a gift index of 67.69/100.
MEDIUM MUNICIPALITIES, THE RECORD GOES TO THE CENTRAL-SOUTH. It is Corato, a city of almost 50,000 inhabitants in the province of Bari, the most generous municipality in Italy among medium-large ones (from 30 to 100,000 residents). The Apulian center achieved a gift index of 77.65/100, more than 10 points more than the previous year, reaching a consensus rate of 81.5% with very low abstention (19.1%). Overall, the data for many southern municipalities improve, despite the opposition to donation in the South tending to remain higher than in the rest of Italy. In second place is Nuoro, first one year ago.
SMALL MUNICIPALITIES, GERACI SICULO (PA) ONCE AGAIN THE MOST GENEROUS TOWN Among the centers with less than 5,000 inhabitants, once again Geraci Siculo, a small town in the Madonie in Palermo, comes first, with a gift index of 94.58/100, a consensus rate of 96.8% and an abstention at 6 .9%.