This year's "National Day to Save Lives" will be held on May 7th, and for the first time since its inception, it has become a national project in partnership with the Ministry of Health.
This day will be noted with a long line of events that will take place all over the country with the aim of increasing public awareness of life-saving actions.
This year events will focus on increasing the number of people signing ADI cards (Organ Donor Registry), Israel's blood reservoirs, and raising awareness of the significance of adopting healthy lifestyle choices, the value of prevention and the importance of screening for early detection.
The "National Day to Save Lives" events will be led by Rothschild Ambassadors Organization, established by the Rothschild Caesarea Foundation, partnered with the Ministry of Health, which has joined this initiative for the very first time, life-saving and other organizations: Mada, ADI - the National Transplant Center, the Israel Cancer Association, HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed - Labor Zionist youth movement (the Federation of Working and Studying Youth), Unistream Non-Profit Organization - Empowering Youth Entrepreneurship, Irgun Aharei (Follow Me - youth empowerment), Noar Mada (Magen David Adom youth), the National Union of Israeli Students, Kav Hazinuk ("The Starting Line" - empowering high potential youth from the peripheral region) and other organizations.
2013 marks a record year for the number of participants and volunteers taking part in the project and the number of registration and donation stands to be dispersed throughout the country.
Over 400 students, members of the Rothschild Ambassadors Organization from all over Israel, will be stationed in over 20 cities and towns from the north to the south, and, along with hundreds of volunteers, will staff over 120 registration and donation stands that will open throughout the day.
Volunteers and activists will help citizens sign ADI cards (organ donor sign-up), and will also help Magen David Adom representatives responsible for collecting blood, by enlisting volunteer blood donors at the blood drive locations.
Additionally, Magen David Adom volunteers will deliver first aid workshops and the Israel Cancer Association will host public information booths to increase awareness of the importance of adopting healthy lifestyle choices, promote the value of prevention and heighten awareness of the magnitude of early detection efforts.
This year a special emphasis will be placed on promoting awareness of the importance of saving lives among the Arab society.
In an unprecedented move, mobile vehicles and volunteers will also patrol Arab villages throughout Israel, such as Rahat, Nazareth, Sachnin, Julis, and Beit Jan.
In the "Day to Save Lives" events that took place two years ago, Rothschild Ambassadors and project volunteers managed to collect over 10,000 signatures on ADI cards (organ transplant donor cards) as well as thousands of blood samples, and in addition, succeeded in raising over NIS 100,000 (NIS 80,000 last year and about NIS 40,000 two years ago) for associations and organizations engaged in life-saving work.
About 1,000 individuals await organ transplants each year. About 100 of them die every year as a result of the lack in donations. According to up-to-date statistics from the Israel Blood Bank, the percentage of blood donors in Israel stands at less than 5% and the health system in Israel needs about 1,300 blood donations every day.
Similarly, in Israel there are over 200,000 cancer patients and survivors, and about 28,000 new patients are diagnosed each year. Most prevalent cancers are preventable and may be detected early on, thus enabling to cure the disease, and this is what makes public information and increasing public awareness of this subject ever more crucial.
Click here to visit the Day to Saves Lives website (Hebrew and Arabic)