|
|
|
   |
| ||||||
|
|
Thursday, March 31, 2005 Press Release SOURCE: LifeSharers LifeSharers Urges Americans to Donate Life WiselyApril is National Donate Life Month NASHVILLE, Tenn. – March 31, 2005 – During National Donate Life Month in April, a network of organ donors called LifeSharers is urging Americans to “Donate Life Wisely”. LifeSharers says Americans can save their own lives by agreeing to donate their organs after they die. LifeSharers is a non-profit national grass-roots organ donation network. Membership is free and open to all at http://www.lifesharers.org. Members agree to donate their organs when they die. They also agree to offer their organs first to fellow members before making them available to others. “LifeSharers members donate life wisely,” says David J. Undis, Executive Director of LifeSharers. “They increase their chance of getting an organ if they ever need one, they provide an incentive for others to become donors, and they make the organ allocation system fairer.” By giving registered organ donors an edge over non-donors in the organ allocation process, LifeSharers gives all Americans a powerful incentive to do their part in helping reduce the organ shortage. That shortage has existed ever since the first transplant operations were performed, and it is getting larger every year. According to the United Network for Organ Sharing, over 87,000 Americans are on the national organ transplant waiting list. Another 40,000 more people will join the list this year. “Donating your organs when you die is a wonderful thing,” says Lawrence W. Reed, President of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland, Michigan. “Donating your organs to people who have promised to donate theirs is even more wonderful, because it gives everyone else another good reason to do the same. That’s what LifeSharers members do.” Currently, about 70% of the organs transplanted in the United States go to people who haven’t agreed to donate their own organs when they die. LifeSharers makes the organ allocation system fairer, by using directed donation to help organ donors get their fair share of organs. Directed donation as practiced by LifeSharers members is legal under federal law and under the laws of all fifty states and the District of Columbia. “I am a registered organ donor,” says David R. Henderson, Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution in Stanford, California. “I want my organs to go to people who have agreed to donate theirs. I’d rather not have them go to someone who is too lazy or too inconsiderate to sign a donor card. That’s why I joined LifeSharers.” “There are only three things you can do with your organs after you die,” adds Mr. Undis. “You can bury them, you can cremate them, or you can share them with your fellow man. When you consider that your organs could save several lives, it’s spectacularly unkind not to donate them. Yet only about 30% of Americans are registered organ donors.” Over 6,000 Americans die every year waiting for organ transplants. Most of these deaths are unnecessary. Every year, Americans bury or cremate about 20,000 transplantable organs. More than half of the people who need a transplant in the United States die before they get one. About LifeSharers LifeSharers is a 501(c)(3) non-profit network of organ donors. Membership in LifeSharers is free and open to all. Parents can enroll their minor children. 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. Since its launch on May 22, 2002, LifeSharers has attracted 2,977 members, including members in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The LifeSharers web site is at http://www.lifesharers.org. Lawrence W. Reed and David R. Henderson are advisors to LifeSharers. More information about Mr. Reed is available at http://www.mackinac.org/bio.asp?ID=3 More information about Mr. Henderson is available at http://www.davidrhenderson.com/biography.html Contact:
Click here to download and print a copy of this press release. Click here to join the distribution list for LifeSharers press releases. |
|
|
|
