THOSE involved in the health industry charged with the task of encouraging Australian families to talk about organ donation have a tough job.
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So often people don’t want to talk about donation because of its relationship to the donor’s death.
But increasingly programs such as “Donate life” are getting the message across that talking about donation is not about being morbid but instead about ensuring that we honour the wishes of our loved ones, just as they would honour ours.
So it is appropriate that organ donation was last night the topic of conversation for some of the region’s leading sportspeople at the Wodonga Bulldogs clubrooms.
The figures are sobering. Of the 1 per cent of deaths suitable for organ donation, just over half of the families of those potential donors would agree to the procedure.
And while our medical expertise means our transplant success rate is high, our donation rate is one of the lowest in the developed world.
It’s a message that needs to get through and who better to kick it off than those among the fittest in our community.
