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Prepared Witness Testimony The House Committee on Energy and Commerce
Assessing Initiatives to Increase Organ Donations
Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations
Mr. Richard DeVos
I want to thank the Energy and Commerce Committee for giving me the opportunity to testify on the subject of "Assessing Initiatives to Increase Organ Donations." The subject of increasing organ donations is very close to my heart, and I feel very passionate about doing something to improve it. While years of deliberations have taken place, 16 patients die every day waiting for available organs that our present system fails to have donated. In their names, we should act now to correct this tragic failure of our system. The key of our proposal is to shift the decision to the donor (Donor Authorization), as the previous speakers have proposed. Having been on the Board of the second largest donor hospital of deceased organs in the country and still missing a large number of possible donors, we became aware that when the patient's desires are known, almost always the organ donation follows. In the best American tradition, it is right that each individual make provisions to decide when they are able to participate in the decision of what is to be done with their organs in the event of brain death. This notion has finally taken hold in the transplant communities around the country and is now favored by many professional and family associations. To be successful and access the 50% of the donor candidates that we are missing now, it will require the massive enrollment of millions of citizens. Educational campaigns, advertisements, enrollment drives, and all the methods tried up to now have yielded less than 40% of the population signing, where available, on the back of driver's licenses or donor cards, and proportionally even less people joining potential donor organizations. For these reasons and based upon "Project Donor" of Gene Epstein and Al Boessmann, we propose to offer a $10,000 free term insurance-like benefit or a similar tax credit only to induce the individuals to sign the witnessed document when offered with the tax return form or driver's license application. These two activities reach almost 100% of the USA population at one time or another in their life. Why $10,000? Because it is an amount significant enough to make the individuals focus on the document offered and the designation of the after-death beneficiary of their generosity. To address the right concerns of minorities that they would not be given adequate terminal care if an insurance or tax credit exists, this document can be accessed only when the patient has been declared brain dead and the family has been notified. Each kidney transplanted alone saves between $200,000 and $400,000 to the insurers paying to keep these patients alive on the waiting list. Medicare pays 60% of these bills. This proposal respects the autonomy of the individual, has been accepted by many diverse religious and ethical organizations, addresses the concern of minorities about their possible terminal care, empowers the poorer members of society to bequeath to their families the societal recognition of their generosity, and it makes economical sense, saving billions of dollars to the present payers.
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