an organizationDeclaration of Istanbul Custodian Group

The body that keeps the Declaration of Istanbul on Organ Trafficking and Transplant Tourism. Formed in 2010 to carry forward the 2008 Istanbul summit, sponsored by The Transplantation Society and the International Society of Nephrology, and endorsed by more than 80 international professional organisations. The Declaration was revised in 2018.

The 2008 summit named a thing the transplant community had been describing around for years: patients crossing borders to buy organs from people who were paid, coerced or trafficked, and coming home with a graft and an infection while the seller kept a scar and a shortened life.

The Declaration is a professional instrument. It has no enforcement, imposes no penalty and creates no offence. It gives "ethical guidance and support for medical professionals, policymakers, professional societies, national health authorities, and inter-governmental organizations", and it has been used as the reference text when countries did write law.

Inference — that is why it sits on this site as an organisation and an event rather than as a rule. It is the clearest case in the field of a trade being reshaped by a professional consensus rather than by a statute, and the clearest case of the field's own practitioners drawing a line inside it: this part of cross-border care is not like the others, and the Declaration says why.

The Custodian Group maintains the text, collects endorsements, reports on implementation and supports national bodies applying it. Endorsement is by professional organisation, not by state.

As of 16 September 2026 the 2018 edition is current, and the Group states its goal that everyone in need should benefit from transplant "without relying on unethical and exploitive practices".