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East County News Service
October 20, 2015 (Sacramento)--If you receive a new heart, lung, kidney or other donated organ, you may have an undocumented immigrant to thank.
Donate Life California, which runs California’s organ and tissue registry, reports that the number of organ donors has increased by nearly a third – 30 percent – since a new law took effect in January allowing undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses.
The Department of Motor Vehicles asks new drivers if they would like to sign up for the organ donor list. The surge in new donors came as over half a million undocumented immigrants obtained driver’s licenses for the first time. Nearly all –95%--of those asked by the DMV agree to join the organ donor list.
Still more donations are needed, however, since more than 23,000 Californians remain on transplant waiting lists.
Tracy Bryan, spokesperson for Donate Life California, says that one in three people on the transplant waiting list die without ever receiving a vitally needed organ, the Sacramento Bee reports. But she adds, “The rising number of local and statewide donations provides real hope.”
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