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Right now in Wyoming, more than 100 people are waiting and hoping for a life-saving organ transplant. And amid National Donate Life Month, residents across the state and country are being encouraged …
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Right now in Wyoming, more than 100 people are waiting and hoping for a life-saving organ transplant. And amid National Donate Life Month, residents across the state and country are being encouraged to boost those hopes by registering as an organ donor.
“[By] saying ‘yes’ to be an organ, eye and tissue donor, you are not just checking a box — you are saving and healing lives,” says a proclamation approved by the Powell City Council and signed by Powell Mayor John Wetzel on Monday, April 1.
In Wyoming, more than 58% of people sign up to be an organ and tissue donor when they apply for a driver’s license or state ID card. According to the Denver-based nonprofit Donor Alliance, that’s one of the top sign-up rates in the country.
People can donate a kidney or portions of other body parts while they’re still living, but the registration specifically relates to deceased organ donation — agreeing to allow your heart, bones or many other parts to be given to others after your death.
Last year, a record 307 organ donors saved the lives of 918 people across Wyoming and Colorado while 1,703 tissue donors provided nearly 144,000 grafts, according to Donor Alliance figures.
The city’s proclamation says the decision to register, “reflects deep commitment to one another and confirms there is good in all of us.”
The document was brought to the council by local resident Pat Thomas, whose daughter, Kathleen Shannon, was a donor; when Shannon died suddenly in 2009, her corneas and tissue helped nearly two dozen people. The gratitude of one of those recipients later inspired Thomas to become an advocate for donation.
“It gives me an opportunity to do something so special in Kathleen’s memory,” Thomas told the Donor Alliance last year. “I just wanted something good to come out of our tragedy.”
To join the donor registry or get more information, visit donatelifewyoming.org.
Preventing child abuse
April is also being recognized as Child Abuse Awareness and Prevention Month.
A separate proclamation from the city seeks to bring attention to the roughly 800 Wyoming children who are abused or neglected each year and to prevent future mistreatment.
“Every child is precious and deserves to grow up in a healthy, safe, nurturing environment free from harmful effects of abuse and neglect,” says a portion of the document.
