The Children’s Organ Transplant Association (COTA) was founded 25 years ago when residents of Bloomington, Ind., rallied around a little boy who needed a life-saving liver transplant. In less than eight weeks, the community raised $100,000 to place the boy on the organ waiting list. But the child died before an organ became available. Those community volunteers, along with his parents, turned tragedy to triumph by using the funds raised to help other transplant families. That was the beginning of COTA.
Since 1986, COTA has assisted more than 1,600 patients and has helped raise more than $60 million for transplant-related expenses. COTAhas built volunteer networks across the nation in an attempt to ensure that no child or young adult needing an organ or tissue transplant is excluded from a transplant waiting list due to a lack of funds.
COTA needs your help to make sure that tragedies, like the one that was the catalyst in founding COTA, are not repeated.
Every day 19 people die waiting for an organ transplant here in the United States. April is National Donate Life Month. I urge readers to take time this month to register to become an organ donor. Then, encourage your friends, family members, neighbors and associates to take three simple — and life-saving — steps: register to be an organ donor through your state’s Department of Motor Vehicles or complete an organ donor card, express your wish to be a donor to family members, and carry your organ donor card at all times.
You can do more. Find out how you can help a COTA child living nearby who is in need by visiting www.cota.org. Log on today to see how you can give hope and make a miracle in your community!
Rick Lofgren
Certified Fund Raising
Executive President and
Chief Executive Officer
COTA