§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps he will take to encourage people from ethnic minorities to volunteer as bone marrow donors. [19170]
§ Mr. BoatengBone marrow donors are recruited through two organisations. The British Bone Marrow Register is funded through the national health service and recruits from blood donors at blood donation sessions. The Anthony Nolan Bone Marrow Trust is a charity funded by voluntary giving and recruits donors from the general public through local and national publicity campaigns. Both of these organisations, as well as some local campaigns, are working to encourage donation from ethnic minority groups.
The Anthony Nolan Trust has been particularly active in this field, both nationally and locally. It has produced leaflets and posters to encourage donations from the African-Caribbean community and has also worked to encourage people from the Greek and Turkish communities to come forward as donors. This year the Department funded through the Anthony Nolan Bone Marrow Trust a commercial to be included in Asian video films to appeal to the Asian community to donate blood and bone marrow.
There have also been local campaigns. In Birmingham, for example, transplant co-ordinators have produced a multi-ethnic poster to encourage donation generally (the poster features the organ donation card) by people from ethnic minority groups.
More generally, there are continuing campaigns to encourage positive attitudes towards tissue donation. During this year, the Department is promoting a wide range of measures designed to increase the number of regular blood donors through raising awareness of the need to maintain supplies of blood to hospitals. This includes the launch this year of a new 3 to 5 year publicity strategy, designed to increase the current donor base. As the British Bone Marrow Register recruits solely from those who are blood donors any success in increasing blood donation should also lead to increased numbers registering as potential bone marrow donors.