In 2005, in response to questions raised by some pregnant women and medical institutions about how to deal with postpartum placenta, the Ministry of Health made it clear that postpartum placenta belongs to pregnant women. Placenta abandoned or donated by pregnant women can be disposed of by medical institutions. No unit or individual may buy or sell placenta. Placenta may cause the spread of infectious diseases, medical institutions should promptly inform the parturient, disinfect in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Law on the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases and the Regulations on the Management of Medical Wastes, and dispose of medical wastes.
According to the regulations, all pregnant women will sign an informed consent form for placenta disposal with the hospital before delivery. The options include that pregnant women give up the placenta and hand it over to medical institutions for disposal according to regulations, and pregnant women dispose of the placenta by themselves.
Once the mother gave up the placenta and handed it over to a medical institution for disposal, the mother didn't know what to do with it.
Medical institutions and doctors also have different views on the treatment of placenta. Some doctors said that in the above statement of the Ministry of Health, placentas that may cause the spread of infectious diseases can be disposed of as medical waste, and there is no clear statement on how to dispose of healthy placentas.
In practice, many hospitals treat the placenta abandoned by pregnant women as medical waste.
According to the Regulations on the Management of Medical Wastes, it is forbidden for any unit or individual to transfer or buy or sell medical wastes. Medical and health institutions and centralized medical waste disposal units shall register medical waste, and the registration contents shall include the source, type, weight or quantity, handover time, disposal method, final destination and the signature of the disposer. Registration materials shall be kept for at least 3 years.
In other words, if the placenta is disposed of according to medical waste, its quantity and disposal method should be registered and preserved. Disposal methods include incineration.
In recent years, there have been many incidents in which medical personnel sell placentas privately, but placentas that should have been handled by hospitals are sold in the underground market.
The reporter inquired about many reports of selling placenta and found that there was little treatment for resellers. In fact, there is still a blank area in the law for the punishment of buying and selling placenta.
In the previous case, after the resellers were under the control of the police, they did not file a case because there was no relevant legal basis. After being handed over to the health law enforcement department, the resellers were forced to leave because there were no relevant laws and regulations to punish them.
Zhang Xinnian, a lawyer of Beijing Shi Jing Law Firm, said that in the placenta trafficking chain, compared with the placenta trafficker, the medical staff involved in placenta trafficking will be held accountable.
According to previous reports, the staff of the Health Department of Jiangsu Province said that the reply of the Health Department on placenta treatment does exist and has been effective, and medical institutions are not allowed to buy or sell any placenta. If hospitals or medical personnel are found to buy or sell placentas, they will be investigated and dealt with according to the Administrative Punishment Law and the Regulations on the Management of Medical Wastes.
Relevant persons from the health law enforcement supervision department in Kunming have made the same statement on the sale of placenta by medical personnel before.
According to the Regulations on the Management of Medical Wastes, if any unit or individual transfers or buys or sells medical wastes, the competent department of environmental protection of the local government at or above the county level shall order the transfer, and the buyers and sellers shall immediately stop the illegal behavior, give a warning and confiscate the illegal income; Illegal income of more than 5000 yuan, and impose a fine of more than 2 times and less than 5 times the illegal income; If there is no illegal income or the illegal income is less than 5,000 yuan, a fine of 5,000 yuan to 20,000 yuan shall be imposed.
Zhang Xinnian said that in order to effectively control the phenomenon of human placenta reselling, the state should formulate relevant laws and regulations to fill this gap.