Advocates Urge Lawmakers to Reauthorize the C.W. Bill Young Cell Transplantation Program and the National Cord Blood Inventory, Increase Funding to Expand the Nation's Marrow and Cord Blood Registry to Meet Americans' Increased Need for Transplant
More than 60 adult donors, transplant recipients, family members and medical professionals from 25 states met with lawmakers and staff on Capitol Hill today to urge Congress for increased federal funding to grow and diversify the national registry of adult donors and publicly available cord blood units as part of the C.W. Bill Young Transplantation Program (Program) and the National Cord Blood Inventory (NCBI). The advocates, participating in the visits as part of the National Marrow Donor Program's (NMDP) 2010 Legislative Day, also asked for Congress' continued support to increase marrow and cord blood transplants in the United States by reauthorizing the Program and the NCBI this year.
"With increasing numbers of Americans in need of bone marrow and cord blood transplants each year, reauthorization of the Program and the NCBI and additional funding for the Program, are critical to expand access to transplant for all Americans," said Jeffrey W. Chell, M.D., chief executive officer of the NMDP. "In order to grow the national registry, Congress must reauthorize the Program this year; the time to act is now."
The national registry, publicly known as the Be The Match Registry®, is a single point of access to more than 8 million adult donors and over 160,000 publicly available cord blood units, 28,000 of which are federally funded. The national registry is accessible to physicians and patients in need of an unrelated marrow or cord blood transplant. Every year 12,000 patients search the national registry for a life-saving donor or cord blood unit. These patients have leukemia, lymphoma and other life-threatening blood disorders for which a marrow or cord blood transplant may be the best and only hope for a cure.
Advocates met with members of Congress and staff to share their personal connection with the Program.