A flag representing organ and tissue donation is flying over city hall in Greater Sudbury. The Irish Heritage Club of Sudbury has been raising awareness for the past 23 years that people are still waiting and dying.
"There is about 70,000 people with health cards in the Sudbury area that have not registered,” said Frank Horan with the club.
“We ask we beg we plead with them to give it some thought. You could save somebody's life."
Transplant recipients attended the proclamation of Organ and Tissue Donor Awareness Month on Wednesday to share their lived experience messages.
"That organ donation affects people of all ages. It affects our ability to have a career and a family and live a normal life," said Myles Ryan, a kidney transplant recipient.
Officials said that one organ donor can save as many as eight lives.
"Wow! The freedoms that you have to eat as much as you want to drink as much as you want except for grapefruit which will interact with anti-rejection medication,” said Michel Babin, another kidney transplant recipient.
“It's a wonderful gift not to have to depend on a machine to exist from week to week – what a feeling it is.”
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The Trillium Gift of Life Network said signing up is easy at beadonor.ca and takes just two minutes. The organization said it is important that family members know your wishes.
"I would just like families to have conversations at home just to let everyone know when they can't speak for themselves after they are gone. It just makes decision-making for donation so much easier on families when they know what everyone's wish is," said Laurie Lamour with the Trillium Gift of Life Network.
Officials with the Irish Heritage Club said Greater Sudbury is the fifth-highest municipality in Ontario for registered donors at 58 per cent.
In Ontario, only one in three have registered their consent to donate, while on average one person dies every three days waiting for an organ.
For more information on organ and tissue donation, visit the Trillium Gift of Life Network’s Facebook page.
