The Knesset approved Tuesday in a first reading a bill that would give priority to those who have donated an organ if they later need an organ transplant.  Live organ donors would get priority whether they donated to a stranger or to someone close to them.

Currently, organ donors get priority on transplant waiting lists only if they gave an organ to someone they did not know.

MK Zahava Galon (Meretz), who proposed the bill, said that the goal of giving priority to donors is to encourage organ donation. That goal that is equally well served by rewarding those who gave to a relative as by rewarding those who gave to strangers, she argued.