Popular human rights activist and lawyer, Mr Femi Falana, has called for a total repulsion of the New National Health Act 2015, recently passed into law by the National Assembly, saying the law gives legal backing to trafficking of human parts.

Falana insisted that the provision of the law was fraught with a lot of anomalies and ill considerations which he said has made the new law dangerous to any Nigerian.

When stating the implications of the new law, Mr Falana revealed that the law had empowered doctors and other medical personnel to remove vital organs from the bodies of living people without the consent of such a person, under the guise of ‘‘emergency cases’’ or ‘‘medical investigations.’’

When reeling out some of the provisions of the law at a media conference held in his office in Lagos, he insisted that sections 48 and 51 of the Act were furnished with exception clauses, which, he said, empowered medical practitioners to legally remove vital organs from a patient without the consent of the patient or that of a next-of-kin.

He insisted that the law was a ‘‘clear violation’’ of people’s fundamental and free rights to give or withhold their consents, rights to religion, rights to thoughts, as well as rights to enjoy the best attainable health.

“It is a very dangerous law and there’s nothing to celebrate in it. It is also a very barbaric law which takes us back to the Stone Age. The law has made room for legalised trafficking of human parts to other countries of the world, especially the Western society who will never allow such laws in their societies,” said Falana.

Falana, who also disclosed that an estimated 10 million women could die yearly, as a result of the implementation of the law, accused a United States (US)-based influential foundation of being responsible for the enactment of the law.

“Since all hospitals and other medical establishments have been mandated to admit and treat all persons in emergency situations, the National Assembly has licensed medical personnel to engage in authorised surgical operations for the purpose of removing vital organs of living persons,” he said.

While noting that though a section of the law made reference to the need for the consent of a donor of an organ before such a donor’s organ can be removed, Falana, however, called attention to another part of the Section 48 of the law which says that “the consent clause may be waived for medical investigations and treatment in emergency cases.”

He, therefore, insisted that such exceptions could give a legal backing for doctors to be involved in illegal removal of organs under the guise of emergency or medical investigations.