50 foreigners given organ donations

The bulk of the operations, which all involved liver transplants, took place at King's College Hospital and the Royal Free in London.

Of the patients, 40 were Greeks or Cypriots, who are entitled as EU citizens to NHS services, including transplants. The remainder included patients from non-EU countries such as China, Libya and the United Arab Emirates, seven of whom were classed as deserving equal access to services.

The Department of Health said that these patients, although not from the EU, must have met criteria allowing them NHS treatment.

Three people from non-EU countries were treated as lower-priority patients.

Although implanting organs from British donors in foreign patients is legal, some hospitals prioritise UK patients because of the shortage of organs.

There are currently more people needing transplants in the UK than there are donor organs available, with 325 people waiting for a new liver.

Dr Mervyn Davies, a consultant hepatologist at St James's University hospital in Leeds, told The Sunday Times: "There is a shortage of donors and we cannot cater for the whole of the EU. It is tragic for these patients but the system that we have cannot cope with the UK demand as it is."

A spokesman for King's confirmed that the hospital carries out liver transplants on a "small number of patients" referred to them by EU countries, with the costs of the operations met through a block contract with the Department of Health. Some EU countries, including the Republic of Ireland, Greece and Cyprus, do not have large enough liver transplant programmes of their own to support patient need," he said. "This is why a higher proportion of non-UK EU patients treated at King's come from these countries than from others."

He added that the Greek and Cypriot governments choose to pay for their nationals' treatment outside of the contract with the Department of Health, meaning they are effectively treated as private patients with payments made directly to the hospital.