Lucas Rocha, 29, says he never forgot the moment he was able to run for the first time. Born with cystic fibrosis, a genetic condition that affects the lungs and obstructs the airways, the student and optical consultant from São Paulo depended on an oxygen machine for years.

That changed in 2019 after a lung transplant. "I was emotional to be able to breathe without the help of a machine. I started running freely, with the wind on my face, and I didn’t want to stop," says the young man, who even wrote a book about his story.

Lucas is one of the thousands of people benefiting from Brazil's organ donation network, the largest public transplant system in the world.

Both the list of potential recipients and the list of available donations are managed by SUS (Unified Health System), under the responsibility of the SNT (National Transplant System), explains intensive care physician Gabriela Nonticuri Bianchi, from the Moinhos de Vento Hospital in Porto Alegre, a reference in the procedure.