Proclamation 5800 --
National Organ and Tissue Donor Awareness Week, 1988
By
the President of the
A
Proclamation
The
generosity for which the American people have always been known shines clearly
today in the willingness of many people to become organ and tissue donors so
that others might live or have an opportunity to enjoy a fuller life. Thousands
of Americans will receive an extraordinary gift this year -- a kidney, heart,
liver, pancreas, a combination of heart and lung, skin, a cornea, bone, or bone
marrow. The great majority of these gifts will have been possible only because
a caring American agreed to donate an organ or tissue for transplantation.
We
can all take pride in this generosity; yet the need for additional transplants
remains great. Thousands of Americans will wait this year for a well-matched
organ or tissue to become available. For some, no donor may be found. The
decision to volunteer as an organ donor is a significant act of personal
sacrifice. Fortunately, knowledge about organ donorship
has spread in recent years. Groups in our communities stand ready to answer
questions about organ and tissue donation. The American Council on
Transplantation and school, church, and community groups are involved. Many
States give people the chance to sign donor authorization cards when they
complete their driver's license forms. Others require hospitals to offer people
the opportunity to donate under appropriate circumstances.
Encouragement
of organ and tissue donation must always be accompanied, of course, by thorough
reflection and complete information. Recent medical and technological
developments are posing new moral and ethical questions about transplantation
in certain circumstances. Individuals, and society as a whole, must carefully
consider these questions so that we never undercut our reverence for the
sanctity God vests equally in the life of every person, from the moment of
conception until natural death.
The
Congress, by Public Law 100 - 273, has designated the week of April 24 through
April 30, 1988, as ``National Organ and Tissue Donor Awareness Week'' and authorized
and requested the President to issue a proclamation in observance of this
occasion.
Now,
Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the
In
Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-first day of April, in
the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-eight, and of the
Ronald
Reagan
[Filed with the Office
of the Federal Register,
Note: The proclamation
was released by the Office of the Press Secretary on April 22.