Overview

• North Rhine-Westphalia led Baden-Württemberg, Hessen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Rheinland-Pfalz, Saarland, Schleswig-Holstein and Thüringen in filing the draft.
• The plan would presume all adults are donors unless they have recorded an objection, with refusals documented in the national register, a donor card, a living will or another written form.
• If no written objection exists, relatives would be asked about any stated wishes of the deceased, and parents would decide in cases involving minors.
• Germany currently uses explicit consent for postmortem donations, and prior attempts to switch failed in 2020 and lapsed before the February 2025 election after a 2024 Bundesrat vote.
• Eurotransplant reports about 8,300 people were waiting for transplants at the start of 2025, compared with roughly 2,850 organs donated nationwide in 2024.