More than 300,000 people in Taiwan have registered with the
private charity Tzu Chi Foundation to donate bone marrow from their
spinal chord for transplants, according to a report reaching Hong
Kong from Taipei on Monday.
Chen Nai-yu, who seeks possible bone marrow donors for the
foundation, said the 300,000th would-be donor, a female nurse,
signed a statement in Luchou of Taipei county on Sunday promising
to donate bone marrow if needed.
The nurse was one of 120 people who did so and had their blood
drawn for tests for this purpose Sunday morning in the northern
Taiwan rural township, Chen said.
The Tzu Chi Foundation began a program in 1997 to collect
information on people willing to make bone marrow donations. The
foundation has kept this information at its Stem Cell Center in
Hualien.
The center, which is touted as the world's third largest data
bank of its kind, has successfully matched 1,100 donors and
recipients from 23 countries and regions since the program
began.
(Xinhua News Agency June 20, 2006)