ABOUT WSAL

WHYSaveALife Foundation, is a 501(c)3 non-for-profit organization determined to increase the survival rate for minorities diagnosed with cancer.

WHYSaveALife Foundation’s Mission is to increase the number of African-Americans and other under-represented ethnic groups to the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP). “People with blood cancers and fatal autoimmune diseases require bone marrow transplants when traditional treatment fails. Finding a donor is difficult, more than eight different tissue characteristics are considered in determining a match. Seventy percent of people do not have a donor in their family”, says founder Niambi Daniels Harris. “They depend on the registry and are more likely to match someone of their ethnicity”. Minorities however, make up less than 10 percent of registered bone marrow donors. Many minorities in need of a bone marrow transplant do not find a match until they have reached the advanced stage of their disease thereby reducing their chance for survival to 17%.

Not only do we want to support the registry, we are pursuing legislation to cover the cost of Umbilical Cord Blood Collection and Banking to families who can’t afford the costs. The blood and tissue are source of cord blood stem cells and cord tissue stem cells that can be used to treat over 80 diseases including blood cancers.  Umbilical cord blood transplant offers a promising alternative treatment for patients with blood cancers in need of a bone marrow transplant, particularly for African Americans and other ethnic minorities who are underrepresented in the bone marrow cell transplantation registry, Be The Match.  For African Americans, it can be challenging to find a matched donor within the critical time when treatment is needed.