World Bone Marrow Day highlights the need of donors for those people who need bone marrow donors desperately. This weekend, many college
students campaigned to find donors for upcoming bone marrow drive.
As per some reports, every year, about 20,000 individuals in the United States develop some diseases that could be easily treated by transplanting bone marrow. The transfer of bone marrow could be helpful in treating diseases like marrow failure, lymphoma, multiple myeloma, sickle cell disease and leukemia.
These diseases could be treated easily by transplanting bone marrow, but the problem is that there are a number of patients, but donors are only a few. In 2014, about 6,300 individuals received bone marrow. The reports showed that about 1,000 individuals died because they could not find a donor at right time.
During the transplant of bone marrow, the situation becomes complicated when a receiver’s bone marrow doesn’t match donor’s bone marrow. The reports said that just about 30% of individuals who need a bone marrow transplant are compatible with someone in their family. According to a number of experts, there is an urgent need of more donors of bone marrow, especially for minorities.
In the US, black people have less than 70% chances of finding a perfect bone marrow donor, while Caucasians have more than 90% chances of finding a donor. The situation becomes worse for minorities when the country has only 14% African-American, 2% Native American and Pacific Islanders and just 5% Asian.
