Hema Malini, Soha lead AsliHERO Campaign For Organ Donation

13th August, Organ Donation Day, saw veteran actor and favourite of a billion Indians, Hema Malini and bestselling author Soha Ali Khan appeal to citizens via twitter, to be an Asli HERO.

An Asli HERO is an acronym for someone who Helps Everyone Recycle Organs. The use of the world ‘Help’ in the acronym ‘HERO’ recognises that there is an entire ecosystem that holistically makes organ donation possible.

The Asli HERO campaign is jointly presented by the charitable Amar Gandhi Foundation and ROTTO SOTTO (regional and state organ and tissue transplant organisation), Mumbai, set up under the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare,Government of India.Actors Swaroop Sampat, and Pooja Chopra also joined the campaign, along with the doctors at the Amar Gandhi Foundation. Rekha Rana too pledged her support.

Dr Bhupendra Gandhi of Amar Gandhi Foundation says, “The organ/tissue donation-transplantation process involves the doctors who identify and maintain the potential donor, the surgeons who retrieve the organs and tissues, the transplant coordinator who coordinates the process, and most important, the relatives, who in their time of grief allow themselves to be moved to make an altruistic donation of the organs and tissues of their loved one. Everyone is a HERO.”

Dr.Astrid Lobo Gajiwala,Director,ROTTO SOTTO Western Region,Ministry of Health & Family Welfare,Government of India added, “In supporting this campaign ROTTO hopes to

1. Promote organ and tissue donation after death so as to reduce the chasm between the need and availability of organs and tissues;

2. Debunk some of the myths attached to brain-stem death and the donation of organs and tissues after death.

ROTTO-SOTTO would like to emphasize that in donating organs and tissues one can add years to the life of patients dying from end stage organ failure and bring quality life to the years of patients struggling with debilitating diseases.”

Interested donors can register on http://amargandhifoundation.in/organ-donation/.