Donate Life America unveiled its sixth annual National Donor Designation Report Card during the organization’s annual meeting, held in Indianapolis, Indiana, this year. The document reports 109 million people had enrolled in state donor registries by the end of 2012. The public can add to that number and help save the lives of the more than 120,000 men, women and children awaiting organ transplants by designating a donation decision at www.donatelife.net.
This year’s Report Card puts specific emphasis on the efforts of Donate Life America and its constituents to reach the 18-24 year old demographic, who say they have not registered because they “have not heard about it” or “simply have not gotten around to it.” Though it is extremely important to educate all demographics, the 18-24 is least likely to register, followed closely by people 65 and older, who often erroneously believe they are too old to be organ, eye and tissue donors.
Nationwide, 45 percent of individuals age 18 and older have registered to be organ, eye and tissue donors. Montana and Alaska top the state list with 82 percent and 80 percent respectively, followed by Washington with 78 percent.
The document also reports that of all recovered donors in the United Sates in 2012, 40 percent of organ, 48 percent of eye and 45 percent of tissue donors, were authorized through the state donor registry. These numbers have continued to rise since Donate Life America began collecting this data in 2007.
“Eighteen people die each day due to a lack of available organs for transplant and the number of people on the national organ transplant waiting list continues to rise, “ said David Fleming, President and CEO of Donate Life America. “The only way to give greater hope to all of the individuals waiting is for all who have not year registered to take the time to do it today.”
Here's a state by state summary from pages 6 and 7 of the report.
I'm quite astonished to see the data of Donate Life America. It is very true that so many people die because of lack of organ transplant. Awareness should be there so that more and more people feel happy to donate their organs which will save somebody's life.
ReplyDeleteRegards,
Kunik Goel