Version 1983

, L’ASSOCIATION MEDICALE MONDIALE. INC ASOCIAClON MEDICA MUNDlAL.INC
THE WORLD MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. INC.
B. P. 63 – 01212 FERNEY-VOLTAIRE Cedex, France
28, avenue des Alpes – 01210 FERNEY-VOLTAIRE, France
Telephone : 504075 75
F a x : 50405937
November 1983
DECLARATION OF SYDNEY
STATEMENT ON DEATH
Adopted by the 22nd World Medical Assembly,
Sydney,.Australia, August 1968,
and
amended by the 35th World Medical Assembly,
Venice, Italy, October 1983
Cable Address:
WOMEDAS, Ferney-Voltaire
17.B
Original: English
1. .The determination of the time of death is in most countries the legal responsibility
of the physician and should remain so. Usually the physician will be able without
of the physician and’ should remain so. Usually’the physician’wiirbe ‘8bie without
special assistance to decide that a person is dead, employing the classical
criteria known to all physicians.
2. Two modern practices in medicine, however, have made it necessary to study
the question of the time of death further:
a) the ability to maintain by artificial means the circulation of oxygenated blood
through tissues of the body which may have been irreversibly injured and
b) the use of cadaver organs such as heart or kidneys for transplantation.
, ..
3. A complication is that death is a gradual process at the cellular level.with tissues
varying in their ability to withstand deprivation of oxygen. But clinical interest lies
not in the state of preservation of isolated cells but in the fate of a person. Here
the point of death of the different cells and organs is not so important as the
certainty that the process has become irreversible by whatever techniques of
resuscitation that may be employed.
4. It is essential to determine the irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire
brain, including the brain stem. This determination will be based on clinical
judgement supplemented if necessary by a number of diagnostic aids. However.
no single technological criterion is entirely satisfactory in the present state of
medicine nor can anyone technological procedure be substituted for the overall
judgement of the physician. If transplantation of an organ is involved. the
decision that death exists should be made by two or more physicians and the
physicians determining the moment of death should in no way be immediately
concerned with performance of transplantation.
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2 17.8
5. Determination of the point of death of the person makes it ethically permissible to
cease attempts at resuscitation and in countries where the law permits, to
remove organs from the cadaver provided that prevailing legal requirements of
consent have been fulfilled.
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