SYDNEY – A growing number of Australian Muslim families are getting more warm to organ and tissue donation, following a fatwa by the country’s grand mufti supporting organ transplant.

“When we are in southwest Sydney we were getting 70 per cent ‘no’ (from families), now it’s 70 per cent ‘yes’,” South West Sydney Local Health District organ and tissue clinical nurse consultant Michelle Dowd told Daily Telegraph on Monday, July 25.

“I know a lot of our Islamic families are surprised when we tell them the statements from the Grand Mufti, they say, ‘Oh my God, I haven’t seen that, can you show me’.”

Religious leaders, specialised nurses and community workers have made headway over the last few years busting misconceptions about organ and tissue donation.

The trend became more welcomed among Australian Muslims after Australia’s Grand Mufti, Ibrahim Abu Mohammed released a message of support for organ donation.

“The Muslim faith places saving a life very highly,” Mufti Ibrahim said.

“Islam accepts organ donation and it is seen as an act of merit,” he added.

Dr Ibrahim’s fatwa to Muslims has resonated with a community suspicious of organ and tissue harvesting.

Dowd and a team of specialist nurses work with families in the critical hours after their loved ones die and organ transplantation is possible.

Their efforts give hope to about 1500 Australians waiting for a lifesaving organ donation.

“A lot of people believe, ‘If I put my hand up, does that mean they’ll pull the plug on me before I’m ready? Will they protect my religious customs when it does happen? Will my family have a say?’ ” Aksoy said.

“If an imam or sheik or priest has to come in and do a service that is allowed. We respect the family and their specific needs when these things happen.”

Dowd encouraged people to sit their family down and explain their decision.

“We live in a society where lawyers are more comfortable talking about death and drawing up wills than people in hospital,” she said.

The discussions of and fatwas issued by Muslim religious scholars in the Muslim world on organ donation proved to be an essential component of the fatwas issued for Muslims living in the West.

Several fatwas agree that both life and cadaveric organ donations are in principle permitted in Islam, on condition it is done for free.

None of the fatwas stated that this standpoint would change if the recipient or the donor was a non-Muslim.