The Gift of Life
Sarah is five and in need of the Gift of Life…matching blood stem cells or bone marrow to give her the opportunity of a normal healthy life. 
- Sarah
Just 15 minutes of your time to produce one teaspoon of blood is all that is needed to be tested….and results have shown that matching can only be found within in a family or with in the patient’s ethnic group.
How can you help?
The Gift of Life invite healthy 18-45 year olds, to visit the Caulfield Blood Donor Centre in Melbourne on Tuesday 30th July 2013, 4.00-7.30pm in the hope of finding a miracle match for Sarah…and others throughout the world facing certain death without a matching donor.
Appointments are essential so please call Yehuda on 0425 724 314 or email [email protected].
Odile Faludi recently interviewed Shula Endrey-Walder, founder of Gift of Life Australia and reports that time is desperately running out for Sarah.
For three Jewish Leukaemia patients aged 5, 15 and 61, their gift of life could be in a teaspoon of blood donated from Jewish origin.
Endrey-Walder told Faludi: “Tissue type is inherited. A patient’s best chance of finding a genetic match lies within their immediate family or with those of similar ancestry. Worldwide statistics show that only one in three patients will find a match within their family. But for 67% who are not so lucky they need to look for a match on the Unrelated Donor Registries. Currently there are only 20 million volunteers out of a world population of seven billion. The raw reality is that the Jewish community is under-represented on the Worldwide Registries. Therefore to find one successful match statistics suggest 10,000 potential donors need to be tested.
For many currently fighting for their lives, their only hope remains a matching blood stem cell transplant or bone marrow transfusion with donors of same or similar ancestry. And this week, Endrey-Walder has been told that Linoi Sussan, a 5 yr old Israeli girl, is urgently awaiting a matching stem cell donor to save her life.
Moved to tears, Faludi confessed to Shula, “In 2008, I responded to the call-out for donors and I am very proud to be on the Registry and to know that I can possibly save a life. My father died of Leukaemia at 68 years old. He was way too young and dynamic to leave this planet and maybe this would have saved him. I hope my phone rings soon to tell me I am a match.”
Endrey-Walder told J-Wire: “Testing is done in Sydney every weekend. Anyone willing to help should call me on 0414 780 444.”
