|
|
|
   |
| ||||||
|
|
Thursday, March 25, 2004 Press Release SOURCE: LifeSharers Professor Steve Calandrillo Named Advisor to LifeSharersUniv. of Washington Law Professor to Assist Reciprocal Organ Donation Network NASHVILLE, Tenn. – March 25, 2004 – Steve P. Calandrillo, Associate Professor at the University of Washington Law School, has agreed to serve as an advisor to LifeSharers. LifeSharers is a non-profit network of organ donors that offers members preferred access to the organs of fellow members. LifeSharers agree to donate their organs when they die, and they direct that their organs be given first to other LifeSharers members. Non-members can have their organs if no member is a suitable match. By giving fellow members preferred access to their organs, LifeSharers members reward organ donors and create an incentive for others to become donors. “Thousands of people are dying needlessly every year – not because life-saving organs don't exist, but because we don't incent people properly to make them available in the first place,” says Professor Calandrillo. According to David J. Undis, Executive Director of LifeSharers, “Giving organs first to people who have agreed to donate their own organs saves lives. It causes more people to sign donor cards and fewer people to take their organs to their graves.” The shortage of human organs for transplant operations kills over 6,000 Americans every year and gets larger every year. According to statistics compiled by the United Network for Organ Sharing, over 84,000 Americans are now on a waiting list for an organ transplant and another name gets added to the list about every 14 minutes. More than half the people on the waiting list will die before they receive an organ. Somebody on the waiting list dies about every 90 minutes. Only about 30% of Americans have registered their agreement to donate their organs when they die. As a result, about 70% of the organs transplanted in the United States go to people who haven’t agreed to donate their own organs. “It is a fundamental issue of fairness that people who agree to donate organs should get priority if they ever need an organ,” says Professor Calandrillo. “It's an irony and injustice that most organs go to people who haven't signed up as donors. By introducing reciprocity into the organ allocation system, LifeSharers makes the system fairer.” LifeSharers membership is free and open to all at http://www.lifesharers.org. LifeSharers does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, age, physical handicap, health status, marital status, or economic status. ABOUT STEVE P. CALANDRILLO Steve P. Calandrillo is an Associate Professor at the University of Washington Law School in Seattle, where he teaches law & medicine, law & economics and contract law. His scholarship interests include human organ donation, compulsory vaccination laws, federal health and safety regulation, and the ADA. Complete biographical information on Professor Calandrillo is available at http://www.law.washington.edu/Faculty/Calandrillo/. About LifeSharers LifeSharers is a 501(c)(3) non-profit network of organ donors. Membership in LifeSharers is free and open to all. Since its launch on May 22, 2002, LifeSharers has attracted 2,120 members in 49 states and the District of Columbia. The LifeSharers web site is at http://www.lifesharers.org. Contact:
Click here to download and print a copy of this press release. Click here to join the distribution list for LifeSharers press releases. |
|
|
|
