Facebook on Tuesday unveiled an organ donor status option for Timeline, a move designed to help more than 114,000 people in the U.S. and millions more around the world who are waiting for a life-saving heart, kidney or liver transplant.
“Many of those people — an average of 18 people per day –- will die waiting, because there simply aren’t enough organ donors to meet the need,” Facebook notes in a blog entry explaining the move. “Medical experts believe that broader awareness about organ donation could go a long way toward solving this crisis.”
Designating yourself as an organ donor is easy. All you need to do is go to your Timeline, click on “Life Event” and then “Health & Wellness.” Then, you’ll see the option for “Organ Donor.” At that point, you can add when and where you registered and your personal story.
For those who aren’t organ donors, Facebook is providing a link to the appropriate registry. As with other Timeline entries, you can make your organ donor status public or private.
While the plan might initially seem strange, it's quite clever once you think about it. Whether we love or hate Facebook, the social network plays a role in many of our lives. So when an issue is promoted on the site, we won't be able to escape it. Soon you'll notice the option to add your organ donation status when you edit your Timeline, you'll see your friends adding such statuses and you'll see links encouraging you to officially register as a donor.
Odds are, you'll idly click on something and learn a bit about organ donation. You might even decide to become a donor yourself — and then update your Facebook status, of course — which will add to the overall promotion of the issue.
Whether the awareness raised by Facebook (as well as the peer pressure it produces) will reduce the number of individuals who die while waiting for a transplant remains to be seen.
“Many of those people — an average of 18 people per day –- will die waiting, because there simply aren’t enough organ donors to meet the need,” Facebook notes in a blog entry explaining the move. “Medical experts believe that broader awareness about organ donation could go a long way toward solving this crisis.”
Designating yourself as an organ donor is easy. All you need to do is go to your Timeline, click on “Life Event” and then “Health & Wellness.” Then, you’ll see the option for “Organ Donor.” At that point, you can add when and where you registered and your personal story.
For those who aren’t organ donors, Facebook is providing a link to the appropriate registry. As with other Timeline entries, you can make your organ donor status public or private.
While the plan might initially seem strange, it's quite clever once you think about it. Whether we love or hate Facebook, the social network plays a role in many of our lives. So when an issue is promoted on the site, we won't be able to escape it. Soon you'll notice the option to add your organ donation status when you edit your Timeline, you'll see your friends adding such statuses and you'll see links encouraging you to officially register as a donor.
Odds are, you'll idly click on something and learn a bit about organ donation. You might even decide to become a donor yourself — and then update your Facebook status, of course — which will add to the overall promotion of the issue.
Whether the awareness raised by Facebook (as well as the peer pressure it produces) will reduce the number of individuals who die while waiting for a transplant remains to be seen.
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