Rosie Winterton

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Rosie Supports Donor Bus

Rosie Winterton, MP for Doncaster Central will visiting the Donor Bus on Tuesday 23 August at 10.00 a.m. at Frenchgate.Street.

The Donor Bus, a 1958 original London Transport Routemaster, the only one in the country, will visit Doncaster to promote awareness of organ/tissue donation and transplantation and to encourage the public to register their willingness to become a donor.

This year marks the tenth anniversary of the NHS Organ Donor Register. We know that the majority of people support organ donation in principle.  Over the last 12 months nearly 1 million people have signed on to the Organ Donor Register – a confidential database of names that confirms an individual’s wish to be an organ donor in the event of their death.  Currently over 20% of the UK population (over 12 million people) have demonstrated their support by joining the register.  The Government is committed to increasing this number to 16 million by 2010.

Rosie says

”In this 10th anniversary year I want to encourage more local people to register as organ donors.  Thousands of people’s lives have been saved as a result of an organ transplant, but there are thousands more waiting for an organ donor and many will die waiting for a suitable organ to be donated. 

“Signing up and making sure your relatives are aware of your wish to donate will help them and NHS staff to ensure that your wishes are carried out.”

If you have a donor card but have not put your name on the register, your good intention may not be put into practice if you are not carrying it in the event of your death.

Volunteers bring their own unique experiences to the public to demonstrate the positive effects of organ/tissue donation and transplantation as either recipients of organs/tissue or as donor families. 

In July 2003 the Government launched Saving Lives, Valuing Donors, a ten year plan which set out the framework for increasing organ donation rates and now there are a wide range of programmes in place to hep with this task.